Nicole Holofcener

“I always had good friends, but I did not feel like a cool girl, ever.”

“Catherine Keener really gets me. She and I have such a shorthand together.”

“To say you want to be a director is to risk sounding obnoxious, pretentious, arrogant, and I think women are more fearful of sounding that way than men are.”

“My movies make a profit, but obviously not a fortune.”

“I'm being photographed, worrying about my hair - and yet here I am, I've directed a feature film, why do I care about the way I look? Who cares? Does Tim Burton care? Does Joel Coen?”

“I would still encourage somebody, if they wanted to make a movie, to just go take a movie camera. That's clearly been shown to work.”

“I don't think of myself in a political way, though I am definitely a feminist.”

“I definitely feel like a native New Yorker. My personality was formed there.”

“I'm somebody's ex-wife, and I did things that drove him nuts. And now I'm somebody's girlfriend, for many years, and I've got different things that drive him nuts.”

“I think I'm a good writer. I think I have my own voice, which is unique to everyone - everyone has their own voice; if they would just write from a vulnerable embarrassing place, it's going to be universal, and it's going to be entertaining. Because everyone is the same, and everyone is unique.”

“When I'm creating characters, I just want to create characters that I can relate to, and be as honest about them as people as I can be. That's what I want to see when I go to the movies.”

“I went to NYU for a year and a half, and I graduated from there and then years later went to Columbia for graduate school.”

“I'm willing to give up a little control but not a lot. So I say I want the money, but when push comes to shove, I'm not sure I'll be able to compromise in order to make the big studio movie. Maybe something in between would be okay, like a low-budget studio film.”

“I rarely need career advice because I don't have a career. No, that's not true. I can't really go far away while my kids are living with me.”

“Hollywood is lacking realness in their female characters. I don't think I'm the only one who thinks that and wants to change it.”

“If the script is right, I'm not above doing a movie with broad appeal.”

“If a woman gets insomnia, you never know where you're going to find her furniture the next morning. It's primal. We have so little we can control, but we can perfect the way our room looks.”

“I'm still shooting on low budgets, though none of my movies has lost money, and I rarely get sent anything that stars a guy or is a thriller or is seriously dramatic. And I would love the opportunity to do those things.”

“If you keep the situations real, the characters' behavior will be real and honest, too. If they're suddenly robbing a bank and exchanging snappy dialogue, well, I wouldn't even know how to write that.”

“It's harder to take care of kids than it is to make a movie.”