When you are doing music videos through the '90s, which I did, and the 2000s, you were put in the position, really, as an independent filmmaker. You were being financed by a major record company or a minor record company or whatever.
I had definitely stopped watching MTV by 2000.
When I was doing music videos, everybody was very snobbish about music video directors doing commercials. It was all guys from ad agencies.
I grew up falling in love with music videos and those images: Hype Williams and Mark Romanek, David Fincher and Diane Martel and Paul Hunter, just from the video side. I grew up also watching a lot of independent films and foreign films.
Music videos are really expensive, and if I mess it up, it's like, 'Oh, there goes 15,000 dollars,' you know?
I grew up watching MTV, so it's very surreal to me to think that there might be someone out there watching MTV, looking at us the way I used to look at Davis Madonna and Duran Duran videos.
MTV is known for their huge budget.
And my idols in music videos are people like Michel Gondry and Spike Jonze and Johnathan Glazer and David Fincher and that's always kind of been my reference point in music video and commercial directors.
I worked with three people who were doing video music shows before MTV.
I miss the videos that are short films, back when MTV played videos all day.
I love music videos, and I think maybe it's my favorite format.
