I made over forty Westerns. I used to lie awake nights trying to think up new ways of getting on and off a horse.

I've never been specifically attached to westerns, but there are those I like - one of the best westerns I've seen is 'Unforgiven.' I think the genre has something extremely powerful that can allow them to talk about good and evil in a very straight way.

People are always asking me why they don't make Westerns like they used to.

Comedy, drama, Westerns, sci-fi... it's all fine if the story's compelling and the character is interesting to me. I do like action a lot.

Mel Brooks is an interesting one because he started out making films about stuff that he was totally affectionate about, like musicals, westerns, horror films, Hitchcock films. And then, as they get further on, and you get to 'Spaceballs,' then it's just kind of contrived.

I love Westerns and I remember as a kid climbing up on the couch and make it into a saddle and shoot guns and fall off. I would lay there after my death and my mom would tell me to eat lunch and I'd say, 'I'm still dead, Mom!' I was Method, even then.

Nothing ever changes as far as Westerns are concerned. They are the same today as they were years ago.

The copycat effects of media violence, similar to those previously attributed to westerns, radio serials and comic books, are easy to exaggerate.

I sort of got into Westerns... It was a sort of desperation move, really. I had several pictures that didn't go very well, and I just realised that I would have to try something else.

I'd like to do a number of films. Westerns. Genre pieces. Maybe another film about Italian Americans where they're not gangsters, just to prove that not all Italians are gangsters.

It was quite frightening to be asked to write the music of a Western because there are so many things that you can refer to that can be cliche, and that could really poison your mind, from Morricone, to Bernstein, to Neil Young. So much music has been written for Westerns, that you wonder how you're going to find a new or different idea.

We're not nearly as violent as the westerns.

I've thought about doing other dramatic roles besides westerns, but I grew up in the West and I know the West.

Sergio Leone was a big influence on me because of the spaghetti westerns.

What made us different from other westerns was the fact that 'Gunsmoke' wasn't just action and a lot of shooting; they were character-study shows.

Years ago, when I was writing westerns, other writers who were friends of mine wanted me to collaborate with them. And it just didn't work.

I was a fan of westerns growing up. Every boy wanted to ride a horse and be a cowboy.

Your landscape in a western is one of the most important characters the film has. The best westerns are about man against his own landscape.

With Westerns you have the landscape is important, and it's empty, and only you populate it. When you populate it, you can tell any kind story that Shakespeare told, you can tell in a Western.

In westerns, you meet a hardy bunch of characters. There is no jealousy on such pictures.