I've been involved in burlesque for a really long time and I've always been really interested in burlesque, and I was writing musicals for different studios.

Disney was kind enough, thoughtful enough and believed enough in me, as a director, to wait for me to be available.

This is such a cliche, but I feel like filmmaking is a collaborative experience.

Cher is really down-to-earth, very nurturing, incredibly funny and fun, a great storyteller, and creates a great environment on the set.

Kristen Bell is rare as an actress, because she's the type of actor who jumps out of a plane without a parachute - from a totally fearless place, which is really refreshing and inspiring.

I actually had a movie green lit at Disney the same week 'Burlesque' was green lit - a movie for Disney called 'Mash-Up', about a high school marching band.

I want to make big movies that appeal to a lot of people. That's satisfying to me.

I want to tell beautiful stories. I know I want to tell stories that appeal to a large audience. I want to make movies that appeal to mass culture.

I always wanted to direct. I always saw myself as a director.

I love actors. I love working with actors. I really enjoy the process. I love having those in-depth discussions about the interior of their character, and actors really love to discuss that too.

In a huge way, everything that I've done in my life has helped inform my ability to communicate with actors and direct them.

Before, I wanted to say: "I found love!" But now, I want to say: "I found a person. And he belongs to me and I belong to him.

Well that's very kind of you, but voices ought not be measured by how pretty they are. Instead they matter only if they convince you that they are telling the truth.

Free love is sometimes love but never freedom.

If I lose the ball, I lose it trying to do the right thing. That's the way it is.

I always have a camera now that I've got a kid, but I don't think I've got one picture of anyone other than my daughter.

I'm afraid of being average. I have a real fear of being just another linebacker.

Public opinion is the last refuge of a politician without any opinion.

I" cannot reach fulfillment without "thou." The self cannot be self without other selves. Self-concern without other-concern is like a tributary that has no outward flow to the ocean.

Gypsies at home watching Jerry Falwell on TV, might mean something to you, it ain't nothing to me.

Let's put it this way: the glass is half-empty, but the fact is, I can always get another drink