SW: I think I'm just really lucky. I can't believe my good fortune, getting A Map of the World and Galaxy Quest both in the same year. I actually think things are getting better for actors and actresses. I think there are a lot of different stories out there. We were at the National Board of Review awards last night and a lot of people were saying they couldn't remember a year with so many interesting films, so I actually think the industry must be pretty healthy.

SE: There's a hunger for good stories. A lot of the movies I see I just zone out, because I don't get gripped. Everything has gotten so technical for awhile, you wind up just out-technicaling yourself, you know, until the point where you can't go anywhere, where you're stopped by technology in a lot of ways. I think there is a great hunger for stories about people, and the idea of empathizing with characters has kind of gone away. Traveling around with this movie, I've heard lots of people actually empathize with the characters in the story. Parents or friends find something in the film to latch onto, and I think there is a need for that and people really do want it. We've spoonfed the masses these kind of technological movies where you can go in, be wowed by technology, eat your popcorn and not think.

THC: How did a small studio like First Look manage to secure the rights to such a popular book - and how was the decision made to ultimately cast Sigourney?

SE: It started with Kathy Kennedy and Frank Marshall [two of the producers], they had auctioned the book awhile ago, and were trying to kind of get it going. They became familiar with my work in the theater, and they gave me the book, and I just loved it. When we were putting it together, we made a decision, because it was my first movie and because it's a complex movie, they afforded me the opportunity to tell the movie the way I wanted to tell it. First Look has a branch called Overseas Film Group, and they're financiers. So Overseas and First Look are really one and the same, they financed the film, so they're distributing the film. Because Europeans are so much more open about material, they're not on directors about making it more for the mass audience or anything like that. It was a really fortunate thing that it happened this way because it afforded me the opportunity to tell the story that I wanted to tell. So that's how it happened. Sigourney wasn't attached to the book or anything, casting was actually the last thing we did. It's an art film. I mean it has the potential maybe, god willing, for people to come see it because the book has gotten so much attention, and Sigouney is amazing, and Julianne and David, it's like I was blessed.

THC: Scott, lots of stage directors like yourself have recently made the transition from theater to screen with tremendous results - like Sam Mendes with American Beauty and Julie Taymor with Titus. Was the transition jarring?

SE: It's so completely different. A lot of people ask that question, and it's a hard question to answer. Theater is so visceral, it's so in the moment and you have a picture of it all the time, the acting is all about body and language, and the language is very different. Film is about image, and what I found so beautiful is that you can be more intimate than you can on the stage. But it was challenging. The fun thing about filmmaking for me was that it didn't just use the art part of my brain but allowed me to use the other part of my brain, the common sense part. You're always thinking ahead because theater you're indoors, in a black room all day, but when you're doing a film it could rain when you have to film an outdoor scene. You have to make decisions and you're losing your time, and the kids can only work certain hours a day. It's grueling, but it was really rewarding. You can't be anything but an artist when making a film, you can't have any other life but your art.

SW: You would never think this was Scott's first film, we had such a relaxed set. Scott always knew what he wanted, he gave us such specific direction.