Quotes from John Cameron Mitchell

'Hedwig' was pretty much all the things I wanted to do that other people said I probably shouldn't do: drag, punk rock, stand-up comedy... You know, combine them all in a thing that's supremely uncommercial from the objective point of view.

Having been an actor in Hollywood for a certain amount of time, I always felt a pressure to be sort of a neutral person. 'Don't do anything to your hair. Don't tell them your age. Don't tell them you're gay. Don't tell them anything that could limit you, specify you as a person.' I always hated that, actually moved out of L.A. because of that.

The people that were most interesting were always questioning the status quo.

There's something cool about being a stealth classic.

After the first 'Hedwig,' interestingly, I was offered to play Hamlet a couple of times.

I like making art that's useful to people who have a harder road. Art is a tool to get through it; it's a tool to prepare for the worst. By envisioning it in an artistic context, you can make sense of it before and after it happens.

I've obviously always been aware of actor-oriented films, being an actor. Altman and Cassavetes were really strong. And then I realized their structures were quite fascinating, too.

You're on Facebook, and you're supposed to know your sexual orientation at 13... Nobody really knows what's going on at that time, and people seem to... know stuff, or they have to act like they do, and they make decisions before they really need to.

Hedwig is on a quest; she's on a quest as much as Jason and the Argonauts, as much as the boy in 'A.I.' She's looking for something. She's looking for her other half, and she's on tour. Monsters, Cyclops - maybe they're her mom? - appear on various islands.

My favorite model of success is when people say, 'Nobody bought that first Velvet Underground album, but everyone who did started a band.'

I studied meditation, knowing it would be a huge new calming skill.

Doing 'Hedwig' totally contributed to my acceptance of myself.

'Hedwig' is unabashedly analog.

The think that we hung the film version all on was 'Hedwig' on tour. On stage, it's one theatre, one show. It just seemed natural to change it. In the film, we were able to go to flashback rather than have her talk to the audience. And we had the play to practice and to see where we had made mistakes.

I remember seeing a stage version of Plato's 'Symposium' and being really moved because it was written by a man rather than a culture.

Growing up, it was uncool to admit that your family had any money. And then, instantly, money was cool. In Reagan's parlance, it was about freedom of the individual, which was freedom to be greedy... individual versus society. There was a weird seduction in that, which I still feel.

I'm an honorary old Jewish lady of the West Village.

I'm not interested in replicating 'Hedwig' like a virus.