Robert Altman:
Had I been born in 1935 instead of 1925, my life would have been totally different. I’d be a totally different person. Same if I’d been born in 1915. It all depends on when you’re placed into the river, and where that river takes you. It couldn’t happen the same a week earlier or a week later. You’re in your time and space in the river.
Now you can swim over toward the bank where the current isn’t as fast, but basically from that point, you’re going down the river. You can swim upstream, but just a little bit. If you swim up against the current a lot, by the time you die you’ve only covered a short distance along the bank. If you go over to the edge and go with the mainstream you cover a lot more territory but you’re not exercising.
I don’t think you ever have the energy to beat the river. The river’s always going faster than you can swim against it. The reason, I think, you fight against something is simply because it’s there to fight against. I think I go upstream because it’s the easiest place for me to go. But I’m over at the edge, not in the center of it. In other words I’m not making the long distance swim across the channel, I take the easiest path upstream.
