People think, 'Oh, well how can 'The Hobbit,' which is one book, become three films?' But you can take one line from an appendice and it turns into a whole sequence.

You never really know why you become an actor: it's a visceral thing, an emotional thing.

If one line about the film excites me, I try to take it forward.

In terms of animation, animators are actors as well. They are fantastic actors. They have to draw from how they feel emotionally about the beat of a scene that they're working on. They work collaboratively.

He had one scene, one scene, and I think he had one line. And he was a director, and I was the actor auditioning. It was a spoof on what happens in Hollywood.

I'd already started directing short films when we were doing 'Lord of the Rings,' then videogame projects.