Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
I've always known that if I recorded an album, it would come out, and people would enjoy it! Whereas if I wrote a movie script, chances are better than even that I'd just be another guy in L.A. with a movie script in his drawer.
When I choose projects, I don't stipulate between film or theatre or television. I receive scripts and I read scripts - and when I read a script that's good, I then get married to it and talk to my agent about what happens next.
I don't speculate too much about the future. That's the thing about this job - it's so fickle. You take the jobs, you read the scripts and, if something interests you and you like the people who are working on it, you go for it.
I heard a lot of scripts after 'Hero' but did not get that wow feel. It was more of a package comprising four songs, four action sequences etc. I did not want to do that because I was looking for a story in a real kind of space.
I have a background in theater. At the time I read The Loved Ones script, I was playing Catherine the Great of Russia onstage. Straight after that, I played Stella in A Streetcar Named Desire and Isabella in Measure for Measure.
I went on an audition once for a show, and the feedback was to play an angry teen. My agent convinced me to try out. I was really bitter for a while, because it sucks when you don't get good scripts after working on good quality.
I thought I'd give myself 10 years as an entertainment journalist and build up so much clout that there was no way Hollywood could ignore me when I started delivering scripts. Little did I know they were very good at ignoring it.
I don't like the word 'autobiography.' I rather like the term 'autofiction.' The second you make a script out of the story of your life, it becomes fictional. Of course, the truth is never far. But the story is created out of it.
I didn't read the script [ Rules Don't Apply ] for a couple years. It basically amounted to this kind of apprenticeship with Warren [Beatty]: conversations and learning about his whole background in the film industry and his life.
Like in 'Eastenders' they can write coronavirus into the scripts, so people can actually be socially distancing. But if you're in a sketch show where you're on top of each other, doing stupid things, you can't really make it work.
The problem with independent films is that they can be hit or miss. I've seen scripts that have blown me away. But there have to be all the right ingredients in place to make them work: the director, cast, publicity, distribution.
Many other directors, they have lots of scripts and they never rehearse as much, and you never really have time to be a part of it. With Jean-Luc, you always had time to be a part of it. It's difficult to explain to normal people.
It was interesting to write ad films and scripts for TV shows before I moved on to writing a feature film. That helped me grow as a writer, and I also found out how long I could sit in front of a computer and see something through.
Finding a good script is really difficult and the scariest thing of all is when they say about a script that's not right, "we will fix it.." It's like before you get on the Titanic and you see a big hole. In process, it's too late.
They sent me the script and I thought that there was something very appealing and funny about it. Also, I was familiar with Mike Myers work in Saturday Night Live, but I did not know the extent to which he would make this creation.
There comes a time as you continue to write and work on scripts and screenplays where you realize that you have opinions about the next step of the process, and you kind of want more control over the translation from page to screen.
Certain personal issues forced me stay away from movies for a while but that does not mean I was idle and cut away from cinema. It was during that break that I wrote two books and found the time to dream about new scripts and plots.
All of my scripts are based on other people's novels. Generally, I consider myself as one who writes for theatre. I do not see film work as a continuation of writing for theatre. It is more of an interruption of the writing process.
I've also worked hard portraying an Ireland which is fast disappearing. Ireland was a very depressed and difficult place in the 1980s, and I've tried to include that in the script. I worked really hard to find the heart of the book.
It was a role [Dean Sanderson] I hadn't seen before, and yet it was very accessible and relatable at the same time. I read scripts that have one or the other, but I rarely read scripts that have both. And it was laugh-out-loud funny.
My screenwriting credits in my career are probably not dissimilar to some other ones in the sense that a lot of the scripts you write don't get made, and the ones that do get made are certainly - as a writer, they're not your vision.
I was reading scripts, doing coverage, for CAA. Reading hundreds and hundreds of scripts across the board, from blind submissions to 'Brokeback Mountain'. It was not always a pleasant task but something, in hindsight, I'm glad I did.
I can't imagine something worse than scripts being written into a tunnel, thinking, 'I don't know when this ends. I don't know.' It usually ends when people get sick of it, but I think it's great when it gets to end on its own terms.
In order to make a movie it isn't enough to have a script, it isn't enough to have a director, it isn't enough to have a male actor and a female actor, it isn't enough to have financing. You have to have them all at the same instant.
I'm definitely a messy person... I know where everything is but I just can't organize. I don't make lists and find scripts on the laundry machine, and under my bed, or in the bathroom, kitchen. It's bad, I really need to take control.
With scripts I've always looked at them and thought about kids, you know? Thought about the world and the impact... I won't do nudity and I never felt comfortable with that whole idea or things with huge sexual content - not my thing.
I've been reading scripts where they've been doing a lot of singing now, but within the dark, realistic story line. I would love, love, love, love to do that. But not a musical on Broadway, I don't have that kind of energy or stamina.
Something like Shakespeare in Love, which became such an established hit that it now seems like a foregone conclusion... but it really wasn't. The script was around for a very, very long time and had people chickening out all the time.
It may take hundreds of pages before you begin to get a handle on the craft of writing, and your first scripts may not work. The next five to twenty may not either. However, the ones that do work owe everything to the ones that didn't.
They're pretty particular about what they show. They certainly edit the scripts and have conversations with the writers about what they are and aren't willing to portray. But the writers and the network are pretty much on the same page.
And remember how he wrote the first Rocky in a few days, and wouldn't sell the script even though he was starving, because they wanted to put somebody else in the lead role. To see what he's accomplished, dog, that's what it's all about.
I did get offers from Hollywood, but they were all scripts with monsters in them. If I had done them, I would have disappeared. I would have come back to France anyway, and I would have had to start all over again and lost a lot of time.
My dad was a football player - a soccer player - for Manchester United, and I loved playing football, but I also happened to be the guy in class who was pretty good at sight reading. My teacher gave me scripts, and I was very comfortable.
When I entered the industry, I wanted to work with good directors like Mani Ratnam and Gautam Menon; that's why I did Tamil films. I realised later that I was not adding anything to the Tamil scripts and that it was a waste of time for me.
Our vision is to break the projects into stories that must be told, stories that we would like to tell and stories that people go to movies for. If we can find great scripts that fit these three categories, we will go out and make a movie.
The action star's life is very short. Back in Asia, I can do whatever I want to do. I'm the producer, I'm the director, I can do so many things, but in Hollywood any time I present a script they say: "No, no, no, Rush Hour 3, Rush Hour 4."
When I was in New York, a lot of my friends were studying filmmaking and would bring their scripts to me, as I was a good script doctor. I would read their scripts and make corrections to them for $20 per script and was fascinated by films.
I've written tons of scripts, and when I wrote 'The New Girl in Town,' I read it to my parents, and they suggested I make a movie out of it. I got a few friends together, and I shot the movie in one weekend, and then my mom and I edited it.
When I was a kid, I wrote to the BBC, and the producers sent me a huge package through the post with 'Doctor Who' scripts. I'd never even seen a script and couldn't believe that they actually wrote this stuff down. It sort of opened a door.
It so depends on each script, because you can say... I always thought I wouldn't have wanted to do something that was kind of like as big and commercial as 'The Dark is Rising,' but I really liked the script. I thought it was really clever.
My English teacher always gave me scripts for plays, but I was into sports. My friend said there were small parts I could go up for, but the director gave me the part of Mozart, which was kind of the lead role. From then on I just loved it.
I feel guilty if I'm not reading books, but I read scripts of movies or things that I know I'm committed to that I'm going to do the project. I tell myself, "I'm going to read this script like six times," and I only read it the initial time.
I choose projects that resonate with me on some personal level and projects that I'm afraid to do. If I'm afraid to do them, then I usually say yes, because it means that I'm not ready to go there and deal with certain aspects of the script.
There have been actresses who transitioned and nobody knew. But for me, with everybody knowing my history, it will be harder. I'm sure there are some great scripts calling for an ultra-glamorous woman. And I'm prepared to be ultra-glamorous.
I have some scripts, I'm putting a couple of projects together with people I want to work with. I think that's the most exciting part, when you can hopefully create your own content and find the people that you love that you get to work with.
Having just read the script [Havenhurst] and then add having seen a ghost, I went to Andrew [Erin], and I was, like, "Okay, I have to do this movie. I just have to! I don't know why, but I just have to do it." And I ended up getting the role.
I never do any television without chocolate. That's my motto and I live by it. Quite often I write the scripts and I make sure there are chocolate scenes. Actually I'm a bit of a chocolate tart and will eat anything. It's amazing I'm so slim.
Facts are, directors are not thinking of me; they think I only act in my films, because they're stupid. Or they think I'm a control freak, that I will try to, I don't know, pimp their scripts and just change everything, which I will never do.
Whatever character you're playing you have to complete the entire interior infrastructure, whatever it is - but what gets divulged or what people completely understand depends on the script and what you decide to show. But you have to know it.
Part of me was fascinated by the idea that I would only get next week's episode a week in advance and wouldn't actually know where I was going with it, until the script landed on my mat. But, part of me wanted to know what was going to happen.