John Cleese Writing Quotations

When the target audience is American teenage kids, you can have problems. My generation prized really fine acting and writing. Sometimes you have to go back to the basic principles which underpin great visual comedy.

I think you can write very good comedy without a partner, but what I love about it, working with a partner, is that you get to places you'd never get on your own. It's like when God was designing the world and decided we couldn't have children without a partner; it was a way of mixing up the genes so you'd get a more interesting product.

I want to write a book which is the history of comedy.

Who's ever going to write a film in which I get the girl? Me!

I tend to have an odd split in my mind: I tend to look at it as a writer and when the writing thing is OK and I'm happy with it, then I put on my actor's hat.

Creativity is not a talent. It is a way of operating.

Naturally, people's image is of a performer, but the reality of it is the writing for me has always been the most important thing and the most rewarding thing.

Tension is wonderful for making people laugh.

I've always called myself a writer/performer, not an actor because I basically write what I perform.

The writing is the most important bit, and performing it is just closing the circle because I'm less likely to screw it up than anyone else.

Why write about the past? Well, there's more of it.

Writing is the great skill, the creative skill. The acting is more an interpretative skill. And the thrill for me is the moment when I think of something. And then the challenge is how to get that funny idea to work in terms of the structure and that kind of thing, which is - and that's what I really love doing.

I have a tendency sometimes to get too logical with what I'm writing, just because I want it to be kind of perfect.

On movies, I like to involve the cast in the writing of the script. I like to have a rehearsal period, after which I do the last draft, which gives me a chance to incorporate anything the actors have come up with during the rehearsal period, so I'm very inclusive as a writer.