I grew up quite poor, and the Mormon church was always there for us as a family.

My father, my Mormon father, took off when I was a young man and, or actually very young, I was like six years old, so a young boy.

You know, for a long time I became almost atheist. I believed in nothing. And it was tough for me to believe in anything at all because I had believed so strongly. And I divorced myself of spirituality, I think.

I grew up in the Mormon Church and I have a very strange relationship with that.

I watched Sean Penn, you know, bring Harvey Milk to life. I was on the set every day.

I think it's very important that, you know, gay actors get to play gay characters.

You know, growing up Mormon, I always got the sense that it was hard for the leaders of the church to feel like they were outside of Christianity. I think, you know Mormon people believe that they are Christian, and a lot of people outside of the Mormon Church, you know, don't see them that way.

Growing up Mormon, you learn how to be very, very organized, and it's a passionate group. I mean, in that way, it's prepared me very well for Hollywood.

I think for too many decades, the politicians have driven a wedge between the gay and lesbian communities and the religious communities for their own benefit, and I think it's time to start to broach those divides.

I always thought that the film would be successful if we captured Harvey Milk, like the way Harvey really was-the personality, the humor, the corny bad jokes, all of it.

Most of my family is still active in the Mormon Church. They live in Utah and Provo and Orem and Salt Lake City.

I am hopeful that there are three or four Harvey Milks. It would be nice to have one in California and one in New York and one in Texas and Oklahoma-it would be fantastic. Maybe even one in Salt Lake City. I would like that.

I probably saw 'When Harry Met Sally' for the first time in college.

And the film that I've seen a million times is 'When Harry Met Sally' with Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal, and directed by Rob Reiner.

Here's the thing with 'When Harry Met Sally,' it doesn't matter how many times you watch it, it's always interesting, and you're always identifying with a different scene in the movie - at least I am.

The things that I'm interested in directing are fiction, because then you're not married to a particular reality.

I had a lot of success for many years, and the critics had been so kind. Sometimes it's good to get cut down to size a little bit.

I love Jennifer Connelly.

I love the true life stories and the biopics - people say I'm pigeonholed, but it's a fantastic kind of pigeonhole - but it's tough to then go and direct it because I know all the real people.

Some people only look at the good stuff and some people only look at the bad stuff.

I do try to deliver a solid first draft, meaning it's my tenth or twentieth draft and then I call it 'first' and hand it in, much to the chagrin of the studio sometimes when they look at the contract and go, 'You've passed your deadline.'

I like the gray movies. I don't know if audiences always... it makes them work a little harder. And they have to work hard in 'Hoover.'

We need to maybe think a little less about the science of building walls and that waste of time and energy and start to understand what is love.

When we walked out of that hospital, we had a birth certificate with our names on it that said: 'Father one and father two, Tom Daley and Dustin Lance Black.' And we knew our son was not only ours in our hearts but also legally and protected that way.

We've got the same problems any other gay couple and any other straight couple have. But it's 90 percent great. And that's better than most, I think. That's me and Tom.

There was a criticism of 'Milk' that I found truth in, which was that it was focused on gay white men.

My problem is always the number of hours in a day, not the number of things I want to do.

It's really difficult for me to sit and watch anything that I do because I always think about what's there, and what there could be to make it even better.

As a Southerner and as a Mormon you approach life in this aspirational way: 'I will rise above my station.'

I think of the biopics I've written as exploring a more grown-up side of myself, through other characters' lives.

If you go to Paris, try to speak French. If you go to the South, try to speak Southern. Southern isn't stupid. Southern is narrative; Southern is family.

The octogenarians who have pictures of Hillary Clinton under their toilet-bowl covers - they've completely accepted me.

How amazing is it that when a young gay or lesbian person has their first crush, no matter where they live in the country, they can imagine that all the way to marriage? When I first experienced a crush, in Texas, there was maybe a second of butterflies that were then dammed in by the fear of what that meant.

Our brothers and sisters in the trans community, they showed up to every one of our marriage marches when it wasn't necessarily what they needed. So we have to be there for them, use our lessons learned in the marriage fight - how to win when it's difficult, how to change minds that are difficult to change.

My mom would watch me giving speeches on TV and she'd call and say, 'I don't know who this son is.'

Have I always agreed with my Southern, military, Mormon family? Absolutely not. Have we always figured out how to get along? Yes! At the point at which politics supersedes the family and community, we've got a real problem.

I'd say I'm not sure about Christianity, but I sure do like their Christ and the lessons about turning the other cheek, about forgiveness, of yourself and others.

Too many of my heroes have been cut down, but do I want security guards? No. I've been offered them in the past. But the more you present yourself as someone afraid of being attacked, the more people see you as someone to attack.

Do I think J. Edgar Hoover was gay? Yes. Do I think he cross-dressed? No.

Anyone who says a movie about history is a historical document is crazy.

I'm always interested in getting to know people, and that means vilified people as much as those celebrated. You find out that heroes aren't always so heroic, and villains have some bit of humanity in them.

Directing was liberating and intimidating. It's something I've always wanted to do.

I have no respect for someone who lies about their sexuality. At the very least say 'no comment', just keep your personal life personal. If you're going to closet yourself, that sends a negative message.

I've never encountered homophobia in casting from the studios or networks - not once, not ever. Where you encounter it is with the agents and the managers, they're the ones who have an outdated notion of the price an actor might pay if it's discovered that they're LGBTQ.

I'm my mother's son, so when it comes to altruism and understanding how to do things to benefit a person's life... the women in my life have been much better than the men.

What's beautiful about the journey of surrogacy is that relationship you build with your surrogate, when it's done in places with good law. These aren't women you stop speaking to once your child is born, this is someone who's part of your family.

The real power of any movement is how we work together with other social justice movements.

Through my political work in D.C., and having done 'Milk' I got to know a lot of gay octogenarians. They are lovely and they like to tell their stories, and I like hearing them.

I think that our view of love and family informs our work, the way we empathize with people.

To be gay means you are drawn to the same sex. You can be gay and abstinent. But it's a part of who you are, an identity, not an act.