Women today are dealing with both their independence and also the fact that their lives are built around finding and satisfying the romantic models we grew up with.

I would love to see more women directors because they represent half of the population and gave birth to the whole world. Without them the rest [of the world] are not getting to know the whole story.

There are some things that are real, that you can see, that you can observe, like the moon, and grass and things. But for ideas to become real, they have to be played on your senses.

For me, being a director is about watching, not about telling people what to do. Or maybe it's like being a mirror; if they didn't have me to look at, they wouldn't be able to put the make-up on.

I think if it's interesting, it's interesting, and if it's not, it's not working.

I'm someone who loves to play. I make films so I can have fun with the characters.

It's harder being a woman director because on the whole women don't have husbands or boyfriends who are willing to be wives

Only when you are relaxed can you see what's going on.

Performers are so vulnerable. They're frightened of humiliation, sure their work will be crap. I try to make an environment where it's warm, where it's OK to fail - a kind of home, I suppose.

The studio system is kind of an old boys system and it's difficult for them to trust women to be capable

To deny women directors, as I suspect is happening in the States, is to deny the feminine vision.

He says I'm beautiful as a red tomato

We are under the spell always of what is distant from us. It is not in our nature to desire passionately what is near at hand.

In today's knowledge-based economy, what you earn depends on what you learn. Jobs in the information technology sector, for example, pay 85 percent more than the private sector average.

So far it's 43 books in 25 years.

I have always thought that what is needed is the development of people who are interested not in being leaders as much as in developing leadership in others.

The principles governing the behavior of systems are not widely understood.

I want someone to love me, for who I am; I want someone to need me, is that so bad?

I think we have to be careful about what we label as a prerequisite for spirituality. I don't think you have to know a lot to have a spiritual life, but knowing gives life richness.

Threatened folk live long.

Going forward, anything that Richard [Ayoade] asks me to do, I would be so honoured... even if it's sweeping the street because he's such a great person and a great friend.