Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
As a person, I'm anti-violence.
We are so vocal about what we hate.
The purpose of fiction is to combat loneliness.
One man's uplift is another man's sentimental hooey.
Time off from the news is always something I welcome.
I care about reading, a lot. It's a big part of my life.
Talk about what you love and keep quiet about what you don't.
When I'm working, it's great. When I'm not working, it's great.
Even though I occasionally appear on it, I don't watch television.
My trick is the trick that everyone knows: Work really hard and prepare.
Knowing when to say something and when not to say something is important.
I like movies that are about real people in real time with real problems.
The attitude of the director is really important, in terms of setting tone.
I sometimes don't know what I'm writing when I start writing it, on some level.
It's really hard to be poor in New York - I was really poor when I lived in New York.
We don't have a lot of space in our imaginations to allow people to expand what they do.
I learned a lesson which I didn't heed: Don't put yourself in your movies. It's too much.
In college, you're kind of designing who you want to be. And I wanted to be a big reader.
Everyone has expectations. You just don't want to have them dashed, so you're quiet about them.
The reflexive allergy to L.A. that a lot of New Yorkers have, I feel like it's kind of nonsense.
There are just things you can explore in a movie that you can't in 22 minutes with a laugh track.
I feel comfortable with women. I have two sisters, so I grew up in a female-dominated environment.
Each film is difficult, in its own particular way. There's a unique set of challenges on every movie.
Film allows me to ask some really big questions with the time to explore them deeply. I love the form.
We're like a gardener with a hose and our attention is water - we can water flowers or we can water weeds.
I learned to choose my battles. Sometimes I let my producer deal with something that I didn't want to deal with.
It never made sense to me that someone would achieve any kind of success in show business, only to become a jerk.
I actually have a thing about proper nouns. They clang on my ear in a weird way when I hear them dropped into movies.
I went through this very serious Woody Allen phase in college and a little bit after college. I still see his movies.
I tend to read things that are a little more on the nourishing side. But if I don't enjoy something, I'll put it down.
Acting on stage is still my favorite thing to do. And everyone who's been in musicals knows that there is nothing more fun.
I have great people surrounding me and helping me out. I'm totally in love with directing movies and I hope to do more of it.
I kicked college nostalgia in my late 20s. As much as I loved college and treasure the memories, I no longer want to go back.
Kindness is not about instant gratification. More often, it's akin to a low-risk investment that appreciates steadily over time.
I have really good female friends. I've never bought the whole men-and-women-can't-be-friends thing. I think that's sort of nonsense.
It really shocks me when I encounter people who think kindness doesn't matter. Because I think it's pretty much the only thing that matters.
In writing scripts now, having made a film, I'm much more conscious of what it means to shoot and edit a movie, and that affects the writing.
All of the things I used to obsess over, I'm no longer as obsessed with. I have new concerns but they're a little more existential or cosmic.
I distinguish sentiment from sentimentality. Sentimentality makes your skin crawl. It's like too much sugar. But, sentiment is a great feeling.
What I write is very personal, but not autobiographical. It's more 'thematically personal' - what's up in my life in terms of themes at the moment.
No matter how dark things may get in a story, I feel it's the responsibility of the storyteller to leave the audience with at least a shred of hope.
I really like to travel when I write. Something about seeing new things and being in new cultures and environments provokes new thoughts in your head.
There's that great Bill Hicks line - the comedian - where he says, "Are you proud to be an American?" "I don't know. It's just where my parents had sex."
Well, I stopped drinking. That was actually a big deal. I didn't go through any harrowing rock-bottom experience. I just made a decision to stop drinking.
After a brief period in which I had let many a Southern Californian convince me that it was all 'in my mind,' I am once again officially allergic to dogs.
One thing I'm most proud of, in my movies, is that I think the performances are super-strong, but that's not all me. I think part of it is casting appropriately.
I think that the mark of a great book is that it will meet you wherever you're at and you'll feel and experience something new and different each time you read it.
I'm not sitting around saying, 'Man, I'd really love to direct a western.' That's just not something I'm probably going to do, mostly because I'm allergic to horses.
My whole thing is that I want to explore why you read books, what's the purpose of reading, and maybe that it's not that cool to hate something just because it's popular.
One of the secrets to life is saying yes to change and allowing things to transition, but I also think you have to mark the time and give thanks for all that it gave you.