D. A. Pennebaker

One of the things we found out as we filmed with people who dealt with chimps, and with all animals, and it's really incredible, is their levels of intelligence that we don't recognize right away. ”

If you're setting up lights and tripods, and you've got three assistants running around, people will want to get you out as fast as they can. But if you go the opposite way, if you make the camera the least important thing in the room, then it's different. ”

I think the process is one of using the camera and sound in the way a detective uses a magnifying glass: to find the clues. They're discovery devices, not performance devices - you're watching things the way a cat does. You're not judging. You're there to witness something. ”

People don't really want reality. They want theater, and that's different. ”

I heard the new film, 'Tangerine,' was filmed entirely on iPhones. No cameras were involved! ”

Somebody like Bowie was so interesting because when you got him off stage, he was like a businessman. But on stage, he was just dazzling. It was like watching butterflies grow. ”

I wanted James Carville to never die. I wanted Dylan, the poet, to not die. I wanted to put these people in a place where they would be inviolate. It wasn't enough to have a still life of them. I wanted to surround them with the lives they led. ”

To make theater out of real life, you need to catch dialogue when it happens. ”

When I did 'Don't Look Back,' I no longer had Time-Life looking over my shoulder, so I could kind of do it as I wanted, and it was like I was really correcting 'Jane.' ”

Well, it is curious what lasts and what doesn't. Publishing empires and whatnot would pay anything to figure it out. But they can't figure it out. ”