Having started in sciences, I then turned around and said, 'Oh, I don't want to do sciences. I want to do philosophy.' And to their credit my parents said, 'if that's what you want to do, then go for it'. Then I got the scholarship to Stanford, which was very nice for the parents to talk to their friends about.

I'm fascinated by people who have to reinvent themselves. I did it a few times - I was going to be a physicist before I was passionate about philosophy - and I realized that one more change, and I'm going to start looking like a dilettante.

I think that I must be the only person who left California and headed to Dublin in pursuit of a career in film. The arrow is pointing in the other direction in most people's minds.

I'm not setting out to adapt books and work with books, but when really amazing stories come to you in that form, it's really hard to turn away from that.

On paper, I refuse to position myself as a victim and say, 'Oh, see, this is hard for me, and I'm never going to get any work because they're never gonna look for a half-French, half-Cambodian girl.' I've always said, 'Carry on and work on your job, and at some point, it'll come.'

In my early days, I sang rock stuff, but the career didn't kick until '67.

I had a unique circumstance in which my career was associated with George W. Bush, who went straight to the top. I went to work for him in October of 1993. So my whole identity in national politics is associated with this president, and you know, I kind of want to leave it that way. It's not tugging at me to go do the '08 cycle.

My family, they're not really that involved in what I do. Career-wise, they're very supportive. They're involved after the fact. I don't tell them anything, usually, until I'm finished filming it or mid-way through filming it. It's just a job, and I approach it that way.