Steve Buscemi: 'I have been asked to do Letterman. And the first time, I could not get past the pre-interview, you know, when the producers ask you for four stories...I could only come up with three.' 
Groucho Reviews
Latest Interviews
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Steve Buscemi—Interview—06/20/07
Steve Buscemi: 'I have been asked to do Letterman. And the first time, I could not get past the pre-interview, you know, when the producers ask you for four stories...I could only come up with three.' -
Téa Leoni & John Dahl—You Kill Me—06/15/07
Tea Leoni & John Dahl: [Leoni:] 'So then, of course, the second I stick the knife in the watermelon, I almost vomited. It was just disgusting.' -
Michael Winterbottom—A Mighty Heart—06/07/07
Michael Winterbottom: 'I think, um, someone staged it. But it wasn't us...he did say all this on camera in front of the biggest possible audience you could have...maybe he could have found a quieter moment.' -
Kasi Lemmons—Talk to Me—06/05/07
Kasi Lemmons: 'I saw [Hughes] get up like "I can't, I can't watch this." It's either too close or it's bringing back some old emotions. But he would walk into the DJ booth, and you could tell he just felt nostalgic for it.' -
Frank Oz—Death at a Funeral—05/30/07
Frank Oz: 'There are actors I've worked with who hate my guts. Uh, three. As a matter of fact. One who's passed away, sadly: Brando. The other two are Cher and Wilford Brimley.' -
Eli Roth—Hostel Part II—05/30/07
Eli Roth: 'Let's do that psychology. Let's see these guys in their home lives. And how does the bidding work? And what happens when they get there? Let's go through the minutiae.' -
Francis Veber—The Valet—04/11/07
Writer-director Francis Veber wrote the screenplay for La Cage Aux Folles, and directed such films as The Dinner Game and The Closet. His latest is The Valet—we discussed the film, and his august career, at San Francisco's Ritz-Carlton Hotel.
Groucho:Well, people always talk about how your films are distinctively French, and I won't disagr... -
Mike White—Year of the Dog—03/29/07
Mike White: 'It's the blend of comedy and pathos or protagonists who can be both sympathetic and then transgressive and have a complicated relationship with the audience.' -
Heather Graham—Gray Matters—02/21/07
Heather Graham: 'I think it's hard to have a good, healthy image about yourself, sexually...I'd love to see more things out there that are empowering to women.' -
Ioan Gruffudd—Amazing Grace, Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer—02/05/07
Ioan Gruffudd: 'You can justify anything in times of war. And I think we see that happening today certainly.' -
Chris Noonan—Miss Potter—12/18/06
Chris Noonan: 'She not only kept coded diaries; she invented the code the code they were written in, which had to be broken and wasn't broken until something like twenty years ago or so.' -
Guillermo Del Toro & Matthew Robbins—Pan's Labyrinth—12/14/06
Guillermo del Toro: 'I see the world like a room where a toddler, a baby, has been surrounded by the most expensive glassware. And those are laws and morality. And then you let him walk.' -
Derek Luke—Glory Road—12/09/06
Derek Luke on Glory Road: "I had to retrack every step that Bobby took. And it was almost like I was playing against him." -
Nick Cassavetes—Alpha Dog—11/20/06
Nick Cassavetes: 'I was diligent in trying not to glamorize these kids. I think that they are portrayed as pretenders...But, you know, with money comes beautiful girls and ennui.' -
Kal Penn—National Lampoon's Van Wilder: The Rise of Taj & Superman Returns—11/16/06
Kal Penn's film credits include Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle (he was Kumar, and will be again in the soon-to-film sequel), Superman Returns, Sueño, American Desi, and the upcoming The Namesake. Penn also originated the role of Taj Badalamanabad in National Lampoon's Van Wilder; Taj has been promoted to star in National Lampoon's Van... -
Shoreh Aghdashloo & Catherine Hardwicke—The Nativity Story—11/14/06
Iranian actress Shoreh Aghdashloo became familiar to American audiences with her Oscar-nominated role in House of Sand and Fog. Along with prominent TV roles in the series 24 and Smith, Aghdashloo's films include Maryam, The Exorcism of Emily Rose, American Dreamz, X-Men: The Last Stand, The Lake House, and now, The Nativity Story, directed by Cath... -
Tom Tykwer—Perfume: The Story of a Murderer—11/10/06
Tom Tykwer: 'Yes, I think there is--we took that idea quite serious: that there is an artist in a very difficult, let's say, in kind of an exaggerated obsessive mode.' -
George Takei—Star Trek—11/10/06
George Takei's wide-ranging career includes film appearances (Ice Palace, with Richard Burton; The Green Berets for John Wayne; Return from the River Kwai; Prisoners of the Sun), TV appearances (the telefilm Year of the Dragon, Perry Mason, The Twilight Zone, I Spy, Mission: Impossible, Miami Vice, Malcolm in the Middle, Will and Grace, Scrubs, Psy... -
Christopher Guest & Eugene Levy—For Your Consideration—11/10/06
Christopher Guest and Eugene Levy: [Guest:] 'I could tell, her head was exploding. And I said, "What's going on?" She said, "Everyone wants a wig."' -
Darren Aronofsky—The Fountain—10/31/06
Darren Aronofsky: 'My grandma was ninety-three, and she had a heart attack and they tried to resuscitate her three times. They broke her ribs; they shoved pipes down her throat...It's just--it's butchery. So I think you can go too far.' -
Eric Schlosser—Fast Food Nation—10/19/06
Eric Schlosser: 'Rick and I both really structure our works before we sit down to write them. So it was actually a really easy and natural collaboration.' -
Todd Field—Little Children—10/18/06
Todd Field on Eyes Wide Shut: 'Probably the polite thing I would say is "no comment," but the truth is...you've never seen two actors more completely subservient, and prostate themselves at the feet of a director.' -
Rupert Grint—Driving Lessons—10/18/06
Rupert Grint: 'Suddenly the car starts to roll. Roll towards the crew. And I had to dive in there and pull the handbrake. It was quite close, actually.' -
Augusten Burroughs—Running With Scissors—10/12/06
Augusten Burroughs: 'We didn't have sex because we had to find a way to show each other how much we loved each other. We had sex as a way to operate with each other, and that just warped me, you know, for years.' -
Tim Robbins, Phillip Noyce, Shawn Slovo, & Robyn Slovo—Catch a Fire—10/11/06
Tim Robbins, Phillip Noyce, and Shawn and Robyn Slovo: [Robbins:] 'That Afrikaaner policeman...was made out to be the bad guy when in fact the people that set the policy wound up in mansions with very large pensions.' -
Forest Whitaker—The Last King of Scotland—10/06/06
Forest Whitaker: 'I'm always talking about it in such a technical way, but I have to be honest: it's really much more of a spiritual experience for me...working as an actor.' -
John Cameron Mitchell—Shortbus—09/20/06 & 06/19/06
John Cameron Mitchell: 'Why not just use all the connections that sex has? You know, sex is certainly the spinal cord that connects to all these different organs in our life...' -
Alex Pettyfer & Anthony Horowitz—Stormbreaker—09/18/06
Alex Pettyfer: 'He's a normal guy, you know? An average Joe who has capabilities that are just far out like a little mini--not mini-Bond, but a mini-Jason Bourne, shall we say.' -
Jet Li—Jet Li's Fearless—09/11/06
Jet Li: 'If you play a cop, or the tough guy, Mafia, whatever, you need to think first. You need to understand the character, the personality. Then you put a different move for the character.' -
James Ellroy—The Black Dahlia—08/21/06
James Ellroy: 'Motion-picture dysfunctionalism trumps development every time. I would be insane to think that any original screenplay that I'm commissioned to write would ever end up as a movie.' -
Tony Jaa—The Protector—08/16/06
Tony Jaa: 'You can either change your movements from being a trunk grabbing a person's leg or arms, you can always change it to make it into the elephant's tusk, you know?' -
Neil Burger—The Illusionist—07/31/06
Neil Burger: 'He gets arrested at the end of the short story...for blurring the distinction between art and reality...it's an abstract, intellectual idea and not kind of emotional or impactful enough to hang the climax of a movie on...' -
Broken Lizard's Steve Lemme & Erik Stolhanske—Beerfest—07/31/06
Steve Lemme and Erik Stolhanske: [Lemme:] I'll issue this challenge now. I am the best Robotron player...on the planet. I dare anybody to come and beat me at Robotron. That's a game from like 1952.' -
Armistead Maupin & Patrick Stettner—The Night Listener—07/26/06
Armistead Maupin & Patrick Stettner: '[Maupin:] I'm aware that my best material comes from the truth of my own life, so I try to use it as much as possible. And I have confidence in those emotions.' -
Jonathan Dayton & Valerie Faris—Little Miss Sunshine—07/18/06
Jonathan Dayton & Valerie Faris: '[Dayton:] We took all the actors out to lunch and asked that they stay in character.' -
Elisha Cuthbert—The Quiet—07/12/06
Elisha Cuthbert: 'And here I am playing a seventeen-year-old. Not just physically, but mentally getting into that place. It was really difficult. And I don't know if I could ever do it again.' -
Jamie Babbit—The Quiet—07/12/06
Jamie Babbit: 'You know, I've had so many battles with the MPAA...I think young people will definitely find the film...[and] I think it got the rating that it deserved.' -
Larry Clark—Wassup Rockers—06/26/06
Larry Clark: 'Jonathan and Kiko, one day, didn't go to school...And I said, "Why aren't you going to school?" and they said, "We don't feel like fighting today."' -
Amy Sedaris—Strangers With Candy—06/23/06
Amy Sedaris: 'I like to play and make believe, you know, like Johnny Depp is in his pirate movie. So I'm not digging in deep.' -
François Ozon—Time to Leave—06/19/06
François Ozon: 'It's not obvious to have a male character in this kind of story, I think, because very often the films with men are about action and not interiority...'