"The Closet" is beautifully written, but also features wonderful performances from Daniel Auteuil and Gérard Depardieu...

I discovered something on this film, and that is when you have great actors you have no ego problems. It's only between bums that you have ego problems. I saw Auteuil and Depardieu rehearsing on the set together to be good before they began to perform. And in that scene in the restaurant where Depardieu is eating like a pig, I had the feeling when I was directing it that it should be like a tennis game between Agassi and Sampras, where you watch them both and are fascinated to see how these guys are performing. They worked together so well.

With the comedy being so verbal, is it a frustration for you that British and American audiences have to rely so much on the subtitling?

It is. You lose 20 or 30% of what you've written with subtitles, because it shrinks the dialogue. They are obliged to because you can't encroach on the image. So you feel that you're losing a lot of things. This is the curse of foreign movies, but it's the only way for people to see foreign movies because dubbing is horrible.

Your movies have a track record of being remade by Hollywood. Will that happen with "The Closet"?

Miramax have bought the rights. I don't know if they'll do it, but they seem to be interested at least. I don't know if I'd direct it myself, because I have mixed feelings about remakes. I'd say 99% of them are bad.

Do you have any suggestions on casting?

For Depardieu's character I was thinking James Gandolfini would be good, or maybe even Arnold Schwarzenegger. And opposite him, someone like Ben Stiller. It could be funny, you know?

"The Closet" opens in UK cinemas on Friday 17th May 2002.