I was very into Arthurian myth. I had always read all the White stuff, devour the stuff.

Most of my stuff was sort of of-the-time. 'The Crazies' was, basically, we were angry about Vietnam, and it had a reason for being.

I like having to use ingenuity... When I'm pitching ideas, I say hey guys, the real scary stuff doesn't need the big bucks... things that go bump in the night... you can scare someone without spending a lot of money.

The grotesque has never really affected or frightened me. I guess it's real-life stuff that frightens me much more.

I don't like the new trends in horror. All this torture stuff seems really mean-spirited. People have forgotten how to laugh, and I don't see anybody who's using it as allegory.

I grew up on DC Comics, moral tales where the bad guys got their comeuppance. To me the gory panels or grotesque stuff just made me chuckle.