Sidney Lumet (Sidney Arthur Lumet) Quotes
Quotes to Explore
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Realism hasn't fallen out of favor with most people, who are interested in people's lives rather than gymnastics of style or literary trends. It's a certain kind of academic who undervalues realism, largely because it is not amenable to endless exegesis.
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How accurately can the law fix the crime? There has to be a mechanism for very fast action. The law is like this: catch them and punish them.
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My family weren't actors, and we didn't know any actors. It wasn't even something I was aware you could do as a job. I thought you had to be a Redgrave or a Barrymore before you were allowed to go to drama school.
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There are a few players who don't like to think about the game.
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I do not cook.
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There is a simple rule here, a rule of legislation, a rule of business, a rule of life: beyond a certain point, complexity is fraud. You can apply that rule to left-wing social programs, but you can also apply that rule to credit derivatives, hedge funds, all the rest of it.
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My song-writing has always been just about my life - usually my worst moments.
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Our priorities are out of whack. We spend too much to protect birds and fish at the expense of people.
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Ding-dong, the wicked witch is dead.
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The thing that's going to make artificial intelligence so powerful is its ability to learn, and the way AI learns is to look at human culture.
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I am so lucky that throughout my career I've been able to play such different characters.
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My military service is the thing I'm most proud of, but when I think of everything happening in the Middle East, I can't help but tell myself I wish we would have achieved some sort of lasting victory. No one touched that subject before Trump, especially not in the Republican Party.
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War zones are dangerous, protests can be violent, also, natural disasters are difficult to cover, so there are going to be risks.
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I think for anyone - male or female - in improv, the biggest thing to get over is the fear. I think every improviser has that.
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I think the song itself, 'Smoke and Fire,' is just a metaphor for the feelings that you feel in a relationship.
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In retrospect, the most unnerving aspect of being openly gay was that it turned out to be as disappointingly normal as being straight.
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I don't really have any faith in anybody enjoying photographs in a large enough sense to matter. I think it's all about finances, on one side.
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When people are in trouble they need to talk.
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The only way to gain power in a world that is moving too fast is to learn to slow down. And the only way to spread one’s influence wide to learn how to go deep. The world we want for ourselves and our children will not emerge from electronic speed but rather from a spiritual stillness that takes root in our souls. Then, and only then, will we create a world that reflects the heart instead of shattering it.
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In the birthing process, you come out just realizing how stupid and weak men are! I mean, I might as well not have been in there, we're useless!
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Could we have entered into the mind of Sir Isaac Newton, and have traced all the steps by which he produced his great works, we might see nothing very extraordinary in the process.
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Happiness just doesn't happen. You have to force yourself.
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All great work is preparing yourself for the accident to happen.
