Stephen Sondheim Quotes
Sometimes I'll ask the book writer to write a monologue, not to be performed, just as if they were notes for the character.
Quotes to Explore
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Be aware of who in your life is actually interested in hearing you discuss your writing, and who's just asking to be polite. Listening to writers talk about their work is often excruciatingly dull.
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There's a market for mysteries for adults. That feeling of opening a book and delving inside and not coming out until you've closed the book.
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Philosophy is written in this grand book, the universe, which stands continually open to our gaze. But the book cannot be understood unless one first learns to comprehend the language and read the letters in which it is composed.
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The monotony of a long heroic poem may often be pleasantly relieved by judicious interruptions in the perfect succession of rhymes, just as the metre may sometimes be adorned with occasional triplets and Alexandrines.
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I liked the idea of creating a new pop-culture, folkloric hero character that I created with 'Django' that I think's gonna last for a long time. And I think as the generations go on and everything, you know, my hope is it can be a rite of passage for black fathers and their sons. Like, when are they old enough to watch 'Django Unchained'?
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A good book is a good book. End of story.
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I'm definitely writing my fears. It's almost therapeutic to at least voice a terror, to say, 'I'm worried that Lake Powell looks low and Lake Mead looks even lower.'
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The hero of the book does long to experience God. But his conception of God is very western.
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Conservative humor is frankly harder than liberal humor. You get points for just being liberal. You can get more points if you make fun of your own side sometimes.
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I'm constantly preparing. Material hits me; I'm always writing. I go back and listen to my shows and just prepare and put my set together. But the day of, I like to have some downtime. A nice lunch is important for me.
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Beautiful women seldom want to act. They are afraid of emotion and they do not try to extract anything from a character that they are portraying, because in expressing emotion they may encourage crow's feet and laughing wrinkles. They avoid anything that will disturb their placidity of countenance, for placidity of countenance insures a smooth skin.
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I've learned to really love revision over the years and worked hard to build up my craft muscle to make my revisions less and less painful with each book.
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A lot of the time I get obsessed by little nerdy things in my corner that no one else is interested in. I have that nerd factor in my character.
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Other people are talking about writing books about my life, or about some of the things I've done. I find it strange, but I also feel it's my life and my story, and I guess I better be the one to get it on paper the way it actually happened.
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Sometimes you need to put your own characteristics into the actor, and you take different things from the character that you admire - sometimes you can't see the boundaries anymore.
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I find it hard to write with writers sometimes because of their way of writing. Some are heavily focused on structure, but I have more of a 'Let's go with it' mindset. I like to be creative, and when I hear something that inspires me, I'll come up with a melody, a lyric to that melody, and take it from there. I try to keep it open.
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I get suggestions all the time. People feel quite free at events or even on the street to tell me what they think I should be writing. What I've learned, though, is that this thing, this connection, has to be in place for me to be able to kind of launch into a world imaginatively.
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When we think about a great movie, I mean, what do we think about? We think about story, we think about character. And when the visual effects aren't perfect, we forgive it.
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People really want to believe that there is no fiction. I think they find it much easier to imagine that novelists are writing memoirs, writing about their lives, because it's difficult to conceive that there's a great imaginary life in which you can participate.
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I had to write a comedy set and film a show at the same time. And it's the second time I've been up on stage as a stand-up comedian with untested material. I was saying it out loud for the first time that night. It didn't go how I expected, but in the best possible way.
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When characters change on screen, it makes you feel better about yourself. You think, 'Oh I change too, I'm constantly becoming a better person.'
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I have had a great deal of interaction with Koreans and feel a fairly strong bond with Korea.
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Sometimes I'll ask the book writer to write a monologue, not to be performed, just as if they were notes for the character.
