Over at Vulture, Steve Marsh has a wonderfully odd interview with filmmaker Werner Herzog, who’s being given the retrospective treatment with a boxed set of his early films on Blu-ray.

If you’ve ever seen a Herzog movie before, particularly a documentary, you know that Herzog is strangely mesmerizing to listen to, and can make virtually any topic sound like Nietzsche. In this interview, topics discussed include being buds with Mel Brooks, rugby, post-war Germany, and of course, the abyss.

But the most surprising revelation, for me, was the news that the filmmaker responsible for the surreal insanity that is Aguirre, The Wrath of God has never done psychedelic drugs. Here’s Herzog:

Q: Have you been under psychedelic drugs?
No, never.

Q: Is it because you like to be in control?
No, it’s not a question of control. I simply don’t like the culture of drugs. I never liked the hippies for it. I think it was a mistake to be all the time stoned and on weed. It didn’t look right and it doesn’t look right today either and the damage drugs have done to civilizations are too enormous. And besides, I don’t need any drug to step out of myself. I don’t want them and I do not need them. And you may not believe this, big-eyed as you sit here now, but I’ve not even taken a puff of weed in my life.

Q: When was the first time you refused a joint?
Oh, I do not refuse it. I just pass the joint on to the next and let them do it. It’s their business. I don’t want to do it. Actually, I was completely stoned once with the composer Florian Fricke in Popol Vuh. I was at his home and he had pancakes and marmalade. And I smeared the marmalade and he started chuckling and chuckling. And I ate it and it tasted very well and I wanted another one and took another good amount of the marmalade and the marmalade had weed in it. He didn’t even tell me. I was so stoned that it took me an hour to find my home in Munich. I circled the block for a full hour until finding my place. So I have had the experience.