It feels to me like everyone is going to do their best work when they feel emotionally safe.

The first time I ever intersected with the quote unquote industry or Hollywood or being given a paid job as a director all came because of the reputation I got coming out of Sundance as a veteran Sundance filmmaker.

There's so much great TV and I always thought it would be such a fun little sideway to make money and then not have to worry about my films making a lot of money.

I'd always wanted to work in television once I found out that they started to hire independent filmmakers to direct.

I try to build relationships with the actors, at least to some degree beforehand, whether it's phone calls because I'm from Seattle or all of us meeting in person at some point, which is ideal if at all possible before we get on set together.

Making art, being creative, is risky, especially for actors, but everybody on the set is being creative. You're putting yourself out there with ideas, and to have your brain be free of stress so that it can actually do its best work, it feels like you want to have a real sense of intimacy and connection and trust with everybody.

If I don't have to think about the commercial aspect of it, then I feel like I'm going to make better films.

I hope to keep working with television. I wouldn't mind doing more.

I like being able to just turn the microscope on a small number of people, get to know them, drop into their lives for a period of time.

I'm not one of those directors who can just kind of walk away from the edit room and come back and check in.