"Five Easy Pieces is inventive, very funny, very fresh, and just a joy to watch. Probably one of the funniest moments in cinema I’ve ever seen happens when they’re driving with the two girls they’ve picked up, and one of the girls just keeps saying negative things about trash and filth. I love that Bob Rafelson had such freedom that he didn’t mind going deeper and deeper and repeating a joke. You feel that he doesn’t need to go fast just because there’s a producer telling him the joke has been understood and we need to move on. The moments are meaningful in themselves, and if you’re enjoying them, why not carry on? This is what Rafelson does, and I find it incredibly funny. But at the same time, it’s also deep. I would say that the last sequence at the gas station is probably one of the best endings in the history of cinema. This is the film every beatnik would have loved to make. It perfectly expresses this feeling about living intensely but without a sense of purpose, not knowing where you’re going."

"“I love reading about astrophysics and quantum mechanics. I feel like I’m reading very advanced poetry. Or tackling an incredibly difficult crossword puzzle. I certainly do not understand all of the concepts but my mind loves stretching in novel directions and exploring improbable shapes that might, in fact, be real. My introduction to the genre was Hawking’s A Brief History of Time, so it is particularly delicious and poignant to gain an insider’s view into the squabbles and passions of physicists trying to establish the outer (or inner) bounds of our human knowledge. That such a noble pursuit is fraught with the attenuating demands of ego is kind of funny and relatable. For what it’s worth, I believe Susskind’s distinction that a literal singularity is an outmoded and limiting construct. However, Hawking will always be my OG."