Ken Burns knows he only has so much time left to make a certain number of movies. It’s getting harder to pick and choose which of the many ideas for his trademark multipart documentaries will get his full attention—but choose he must.

“As I get older, I get greedier. Because you realize there are so many subjects that you want to touch, and there’s not gonna be enough time to do them all,” Burns, 67, said this week from his home and offices