There were a bunch of things we really liked right off the bat about a police precinct. We loved how instantly relatable it was. We loved how little exposition was required to tell people who these guys were and what they were doing.

If we were making a cop comedy about bad cops or cops who were comically bad at the jobs, then the jokes would be more hijinks and more like slapstick.

One thing I would say is real cops have real gallows senses of humor and make incredibly funny and inappropriate jokes in the presence of dead people all the time.

I think I always wanna write comedy because that's what feels truest to me; it feels closest to life as I know it, so that's what I want to reproduce.

Comedy-wise, I think Chris Elliott is one of the funniest people.

For 120 minutes, 'Birdman' floats from comedy to surrealism to high drama to quiet brilliance. I felt so inspired by watching this movie. It reaches for the sky and never comes back down to earth.

Certainly my personality, my sense of humor, my outlook on life was informed by the experiences of my parents and the stories they shared with me.