Biography

[Sex work should be] decriminalized and not in any way regulated, because it's a sex worker's body and it's up to them to decide how they will use it in their livelihood.

I became friends with [sex workers] and realized there were a million stories from that world. If there is one intention with all of these films, I would say it's by telling human stories, by telling stories that are hopefully universal. It's helping remove the stigma that's been applied to this livelihood, that's always been applied to this livelihood.

[press conference for Anora (2024) at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival] When I got to the place of knowing that this film was about a young sex worker, what I normally do with all my films is first meet with my consultants or choose consultants to come on to the film. In this case Andrea Werhun, who's an amazing writer and has a book called "Modern Whore" - I brought her on as our chief consultant, and started just exploring character and what would make Anora, and what would properly represent a young sex worker in New York City. But Mikey [Mikey Madison] had so much to do with the development of Anora. I wrote the script for Mikey. When we first broke the idea we actually had a meeting with Mikey and asked if she was interested. She said yes and I said, "OK, I'm going to write a script with you in mind; I'll come back to you in three months." It took a year! But we were in touch that whole time and as it was fleshing out we were discussing the character.

[Cannes press conference for Anora (2024)] I always think that humour is necessary in human stories because it's part of our lives. We all use humour to cope, to get by, and I can't stand when I see a film devoid of humour or a story that's devoid of humour, because it's just not real. And I guess the challenge is balancing that. When you want to tell a story that is ultimately tragic, how much do you infuse humour and where? And so that becomes a real balancing act along the way and I really have to give all the credit to my wonderful actors who truly helped me find that balance. And then ultimately, it's in post-production as well. Again, I just feel that without humour, it's not real.

[Cannes press conference for Anora (2024)] It wasn't until hindsight - I was halfway through my edit - that somebody actually called out the fact that it has similarities to Pretty Woman (1990). I grew up in the 80s; I think that probably Pretty Woman had an effect on me.....or maybe it was a subconscious influence - I'm not sure. Even though I was using tropes of romantic comedies, it was ultimately important for me to ground it in a true reality that I don't think Hollywood would exactly tackle.