“Opening a play is just tough. The idea that actors are weirdly protected from it is a myth. If you imagine yourself having to spend two and a bit hours cooking bolognaise, remembering a whole major work by David Hare and speaking it at the correct moment between chopping carrots and stirring the onions in front of an audience - the normal human response is 'Please, can I go to the airport?'” IfsHumansTwoIdeasPlayWholeMomentsRememberActorsBitsHoursAudienceImagineFrontsPleaseNormalMajorsToughCookingResponseMythOpeningProtectedAirportsStirringOnionsCarrotsHaresChopping Author:Bill Nighy
“Any play that makes an audience think out of the box, that makes connections to life and names our pain and by doing so makes our pain subject to thinking and the process of understanding, is doing something inherently political. By promoting understanding, by putting experience in context, by making connections between the normal and the rational, theatre is an act of anti-terrorism. It stimulates courage and a survival spirit. In that sense of political, there are a lot of serious plays doing their work in the world.” ThinkingWorldPlayPainPoliticalSpiritNamesProcessUnderstandingAudienceSubjectsSeriousNormalSurvivalConnectionsBoxesTerrorismTheatreRationalPromotingAnti Terrorism Author:John Lahr
“I think there's a side of me that's trying to compete with Lucas and Spielberg - I don't usually admit this publicly - because I tend to think that they only go so far, and their view of the world is rather simplistic. What I want to do is take whatever cinema is considered normal or successful at a particular time and play around with it - to use it as a way of luring audiences in.” ThinkingWorldWayWantTryingPlayUseSidesViewsAudienceSuccessfulParticularNormalCinema Author:Terry Gilliam
“[The writer] wants both to do the best possible work and also to reach the largest possible audience. The result is a fairly normal condition of discouragement.” WantResultsAudienceConditionsNormalDo The BestDiscouragement Book:Writing is Work Source: Writing is Work
“My basic mistake in 'The World's Greatest Lover' was that I made the leading character a neurotic kook and sent him to Hollywood. I should have made him a perfectly normal, sane, ordinary person, and sent him to Hollywood. The audience identifies with the lead character.” WorldShouldPersonsMadeCharacterMistakeAudienceLoversNormalOrdinaryShould HaveHollywoodSaneNeuroticOrdinary PersonPerfectly NormalLead Characters Author:Gene Wilder