Mark Rydell American Quotations

Well you know, Woody doesn't rehearse, as opposed to my own method of directing where I really work with actors around a round table for weeks, examining the values of the material, so his technique is very different.

He was a psychotic. He was a borderline psychotic. He was a terrific, sensational actor, with a magical screen presence, you couldn't keep your eyes off him, but he was paranoid. He was sure everybody was out to get him.

He said he wanted me to play a part, and he's done that a couple of times before but I haven't been available because I was making my own pictures.

It always amazed me that he was able to do it, and that Orson Welles was able to do it. I never understood it because the talents are absolutely opposite - polar opposites.

There are a lot of memories that are very... nutritious. I've had a very fortunate career. I've worked with practically every icon you can think of.

You don't improvise. Well, you might improvise in a moment, trying to find something but for the most part everything is written by Woody, every word.

It's sad - it's sad for us old enough to remember when directors ruled, and films were substantially better than they are today. But it's hard to argue with those kinds of grosses.

He's very alive in a scene. He's a very good actor to act with. Even though through most of the picture he's blind, there are many places early in the picture I got to be with him before he was blind. Like convincing him in the office to do the picture.

It's the unusual leading man. Most of the Hollywood leading men are powerful and capable and strong, heroes. He has this vulnerability, he's fragile, he struggles to find a way to live from day to day that we can identify with, that we can understand.