I also wonder why is it that so many of the movies and books that are detective stories are also the most aesthetically interesting? From Hollywood noirs to horror movies like The Shining [1980].

It's always surprised me that mainstream America had the good taste to like R.E.M. It doesn't have the digestible quality the general public tends to look for in its favorite musicians.

The first horror movie I saw, in first or second grade, was My Bloody Valentine [1981], where there's a deranged killer in a miner mask stalking a small coal town.

There's a structure to a detective story that I can easily understand. I understand playing that particular game. It's like solving a puzzle. Or creating a puzzle.

I was never afraid on stage. That's where I was the least afraid. I could just do what I do and I had the amplification and the lights.

When you create a fence, you keep people out, but you also limit your mobility.

I have always wanted to be either a cinematographer or a veterinarian.

I've never had a mentor. I've always wanted one. I'm actually really disappointed that nobody took my under their wing.

Looking back, [R.E.M.]videos, by in large, have always been art films. I'm thinking of "Losing My Religion." That's a landmark piece.

There is a value to moving more slowly through a story.

There's also something sexual about watching the nubile girl in terror. But you do take on her fear as your own.

Lack of power and opportunity passes off too often for virtue.

Apparently rational justifications will never explain all sorts of the different feelings and raw emotions art invoke in people.

It gets really tricky giving advice. The older I get, the less advice I give.

Best advice that I ever got is to do whatever it takes to make myself happy, so that I'll be able to make others happy. If I'm not happy, I can't make other people happy.

Caring for veterans shouldn’t be a partisan issue. It should an American one.

I start from something considered dead and arrive at a world. And when I put a title on it, it becomes even more alive.

I cannot ask of heaven success, even for my country, in a cause where she should be in the wrong.

God has no forms, no limbs, no qualities, no preferences, no prejudices.

Any manager can do well in an expanding market.

All the proof of a pudding is in the eating.