Alan Taylor

In TV, when you come in to direct an episode, you are effectively learning an established language; you then have to try to learn to speak it really well. But on a movie, you are the guy. You are creating the language; you make most of the decisions.

Science fiction sometimes is fun because it reaches so far in the future.

I think calling for more women in every aspect of this industry is a sensible thing.

I used to play with model trains when I was a kid, and then I used to study history.

When you direct a movie that makes no money whatsoever, there is no rush to your door for the next one.

Coming off 'Sopranos' and 'Mad Men,' I was starting to feel like I was being spoiled creatively. I wanted to move forward as a director in TV and get more involved in the process. After having those two great experiences, doing regular episodic TV wouldn't be quite the thrill.

I'm not a shouter, but I like to put my stamp on things.

I just love drawing on past human cultures; that's a thrill for me.

I love staging action and wide-shots, not necessarily going to close-ups.

I love things that have one foot in history - I was going to be a history professor before I sold out and went into TV.

Game of Thrones' was the first fantasy thing I've done, and like a lot of people who enjoy the show watching it, I didn't expect to respond to that world, but when I started doing it, I really started to love it, started to realize that some of the things I'm naturally drawn to.

The Marvel experience was particularly wrenching because I was sort of given absolute freedom while we were shooting, and then in post, it turned into a different movie.