Andrew Haigh

“I didn't enjoy growing up. I was lonely. That's probably my base level to feel like that.”

“There's something about film that offers this opportunity to stick to a very, very clear single protagonist's point of view, and I like that.”

“Coming from a different perspective on a society is really interesting. I love the Paul Thomas Anderson's 'Phantom Thread,' and that's a version of Britishness and Englishness made by an American.”

“I've certainly felt alone a lot of my life.”

“I think there's always a conflict within me about being comfortable and secure and then being an individual and fighting for what I want to be on an individual basis.”

“When I was growing up, I was watching fairly standard American cinema.”

“You work really hard on something, and you know you can't always make great work. It just doesn't happen like that, I don't think, at least not for most people, anyways.”

“I'm happy to do gay material, and I'm gay, and I'm not embarrassed about it, but it's nice not being limited to only doing gay material.”

“I was not a happy teenager in the slightest.”

“Homophobia obviously still exists, but it is a lot more subtle, and it is a lot more in the background.”

“It's always very important that you can completely disagree with someone, but it doesn't fundamentally mean that they are bad people.”

“I think people do like extremes in cinema. There are very few films told about everyday middle-class couples, which is odd to me, as there are a lot of everyday middle-class couples.”

“I think the films that work the best are the ones that seem to be about one thing but then, under the surface, bubbling away, are lots more important questions that you're not really aware of, and when you leave the cinema, your mind is ablaze with different thoughts!”

“You can't expect to connect with everybody, and that's all right. The more I make films, I'm learning that you don't have to make films for everybody. A film can be made for a smaller group of people than that, and it still warrants an existence.”

“'Looking' was always a niche show for a niche within a niche. It's a gay-themed show, so you're not going to get millions of straight people watching it - that's the inevitability of it.”

“I've always felt like an outsider, whether in school or when I'm working or within the industry or just in society at large.”

“With supporting roles, you just want really good actors that can make it bigger than what's there.”

“Lynne Ramsay's 'Ratcatcher' blew me away when it came out. When I started making short films, I would watch that film over and over again, marvelling at how that story visually unfolded.”

“It's always important to try and get a real sense of the world around my characters. I especially think it helps actors.”

“In stories, those are the moments that hit me the most: when people really don't expect it, don't have it much in their lives, and suddenly, an act of kindness. It's like, 'Oh, God! Heartbreaking!'”