Script Quotations

I'd never thought much about a series, because I liked the idea of picking a script I liked with a character I thought I could sustain for an hour. In a series, you live with one character day in and day out - and you only hope it will be one that will not drive you crazy.

I've been quite lucky in that I've managed to tick off a few of my dream roles, really. Beyond that, you wait for the next script to come in that will have the dream role that you don't know exists yet, I suppose.

A script arrived, and on the front cover - scrawled really big, as if it were a book report - is 'Django Unchained, written by Quentin Tarantino.' And I thought, 'Well, no art department came up with this; this is Quentin's writing.'

When I was about six or seven, I did this character reenactment performance where I read a monologue from 'Peter Pan.' I got into a complete Peter Pan outfit and did a little paragraph from the script - and I ended up winning an award for it.

Actors spend most of their time out of work, so I actually spend more time making furniture. The thing about furniture that's much better than acting is that it's just me. There's no director, no script - the concept is me, unless a client wants something.

When I first read the script to 'Black Hawk Down,' I didn't think it was the greatest thing in the world - far from it. But I thought the script at least raised some very important questions that are missing from the final product.

I wrote a spec script that people really liked: a political serial based on Jeffrey's Toobin's 'A Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy.' It was the first thing I had ever written with any political subject matter in it.

It's madness to hand in a script to a director, leave them alone, and for the director not to want the writer there with rehearsals and the shoot.

The director is a Canadian, Jeff Stephenson, and any time I get a script that has any Canadian component, I'm always immediately much more interested.

Anyway, he and I worked on the script together, and I must say he was a joy to work with. Very enthusiastic.

'FlashForward' was on the outs when I was approached with 'Happy Endings.' I literally got the script on a Friday, and on Saturday morning I met with David Caspe, Jamie Tarses, and the Russo brothers. I took the role on that Saturday, and on Monday I was doing a table read. It all happened very fast, but it was super exciting.

I started writing 'Leaves Of Grass' when my professional life was falling apart somewhat. I just had a movie implode in pre-production. And so I came back licking my wounds to New York, where I live, and started to write a script about a protagonist for whom the exact same thing happened: His life was falling apart.

Together with script writers Syd green and Dick Hills, we worked on the comedy ideas for this series.

If the script is good, the cast and director good, I'll go anywhere.

As much as I thought the end of 'Friday Night Lights' was a really great ending, I was one of those people who wanted to make it into a movie. Even though it ultimately didn't work to do that movie, I did work with some of the other writers and by myself writing a script for that.

Producers on Broadway approached us with an original script after relaunching ourselves as 'A Great Big World,' and wanted us to write the music. They asked us to make the music we would sing if we could, and so we can go a little crazier. We refer to it as 'our music on steroids.'

My stories are pretty simplistic, but the characters are always complex and always right, and that comes from the script and my research and reverse-engineering what I find in the real world.

I'd love to work in the States; I'd love to work anywhere where you get a good script and a good part to play. But I do love British film as well.

Miss Fontanne and I rehearse all the time. Even after we leave the theater, we rehearse. We sleep in the same bed. We have a script on our hands when we go to bed. You can't come and tell us to stop rehearsing after eight hours.

'One Tree Hill' was my first television experience, so naturally I was nervous initially. There is no rehearsal, you get your script a few days ahead, and you work. I was also the youngest actor, 13, on set at that time, but it was amazing to be able to 'learn the ropes' with such a supportive group of people.

I never put down a bad script and I never walk out of a bad movie because I'm always hopeful things will change.

It's eighty percent script and twenty percent you get great actors. There's nothing else to it.

I started writing this feature comedy in New York - a Chris Farley vehicle. The script was decent. When I got to LA, I met some new friends in film school and had them read my script and give me notes.

In my first film, we always tried to have a script and work in a normal way, but I was constantly changing things during shooting. Because I worked as a scriptwriter for 10 years, I understood that directors always wanted to change what was originally written, to improve on it.

With film, you read the whole script three or four times, and you really have a solid blueprint of who your character is. Whereas in television, that blueprint is constantly changing and adapting, and sometimes you have to take a risk.

A lot of directors keep writers away because the writers know the script better than anybody, obviously they do, and they have certain intents. But a lot of people would be surprised to know that writers are pretty flexible when it comes to their work.

I like it when a script shows you something new, and you can learn something through the journey of a film rather than being told things you already know.

I envision the script as a story in my mind, memorize the entire thing and have it play out. It helps me figure out where my character needs to go.

I had a feeling about directing Cocoon II: The Return. At first I wasn't too interested because it was a sequel. Then I read the script and was excited by the relationships and its mystic quality.

Bush is a very poor impromptu speaker. He does fine in small groups but when speaking without a script in front of large groups or answering questions he wasn't prepped for, he has problems.

To try and stand outside the marriage, I'd say we have complementary capabilities. I do the hustling and the business. I do more script reading. I handle contracts.

As a jobbing actor, I never get a script and go 'I can't be bothered with this.' Life doesn't work like that. For a movie star, maybe, but for a jobbing actor, that doesn't happen.

We thought we'd write a good script for women, giving them the fun roles that generally men get.

Because these show are live, script pages are being switched during the program and new commercial teases might be yelled in your ear with just enough time to scribble them on scrap paper before reading them.

I dropped the script in the fireplace, called my agent and said, they can jail me, sue me, but I'm never acting again, unless I can do something worthwhile.

My roots are in stand-up, and stand-up is very freeing. There's no script involved; you just fly.

Give Obama a script he has made his own, and he is the motivational speaker to end all speakers. Tony Robbins cloned with Honest Abe.

The thing is I write to music, so every script I have has its own playlist. Music just opens me up to the emotions that I'm writing. It's just a pretty cool thing.

I think I do have a good eye. It's quite liberating, being in a position to read a script and say, 'No.' It's really the only power you have, as an actor.

I don't think I would be a good actor! People enjoyed 'Dancing With the Stars' because I was myself, and every time they told me to say something, I would say my own words, so I don't think I could follow a script well!

I love an acting challenge, and I love getting to sit down with my script and do all my drama work.

When I was sent the script for 'Homeland,' I didn't think anything of it. Three months later, my manager rang and said: 'They are interested in you.' I read it and I realised, 'Yes, I do want this.' Then I got an email saying I'd got it.

The soap opera was so long ago - the thing about soap operas, and there's something to be said for doing it, but you do a script a day. I don't want to say it's a training ground; it really isn't, but what it does teach you is discipline.

A script like 'Nightcrawler' gives me an opportunity to truly realize a vision that's mine, which is exciting.

I apply the three gag rule, which is if I can read a script without gagging more than three times, then maybe I can say yes to this job.

For the last four or five years, I had been in the position where I didn't have to take a pilot. I took this one because the script and the people were terrific. It never frightened me. As we were doing the pilot, I could tell that it was working.

I've never read a book or attended a class on screenwriting. I'm not opposed to the idea, but I like what I've got going on naturally and want to protect that. The one question I will ask myself as I'm re-reading a script for the 60th time is, 'Am I entertained? Still?' If the answer is 'yes,' I'll assume other people will be, too.

It's only the filmmaker. The script is really, really second. And there's a huge gap between filmmaker and script for me. I almost don't care about the story that they're telling; I really only care about who wants to tell it.

Since I was 12 or 13, I have been taking movie meetings finding a project right for me because I wanted to try it. Craig gave us the script - it was set in Wales, it is really British humour. I just loved it.

When I was asked to play 'Miss Marple,' I was given the Kevin Elyot script for 'The Body in the Library.' I was a fan of his theatre work anyway, and I just thought it was brilliant. I was immediately taken by 'Miss Marple,' so I read some of the novels, and I knew I had to do it.

Often, I'll read a script and the female character's an extension or serves some sort of purpose in terms of the male character's narrative and it just isn't fully formed. But they will be very beautiful. Whether a secretary or a doctor or a vet, they will be very beautiful.

I'd rather say no and have said no and do say no often. I walk away from projects if it doesn't feel right; if it's not the right team of people pulling in together or if the script isn't right. It could be a great idea but the script doesn't work.

Actually, it was first a movie called Gale Force, which was a hurricane movie. That script never came together, and then the same deal was replaced with Cliffhanger.

I mean when I was working shall we say with Disney, you know they sent me the script for the film Hercules and I had to imagine what all the characters looked like. And to develop those characters, so nothing exists visually when I get the script.

I think a lot of playwrights have a script in their bottom drawer that hopefully no one will ever see about a bunch of young people sharing a flat and getting up to crazy stuff.

Improv plays such a huge role in finding great lines - you'll be surprised at what comes out of your mind inadvertently. A lot of times it's better than a script you've worked out ahead of time.

If I get a note on my script or my films, what I say to a studio executive is that, 'You know, this is the film of my legacy, and I never want to be sitting in a theater looking up on the screen and seeing something that I don't believe in.' I will never do that.

The movie wasn't really derived from Dark Shadows - they developed a whole new script for that particular one.

Even with revivals, I don't really pay attention to previous incarnations. I always just go with the script and with the director and am willing to treat it as brand new.

It wasn't the greatest script in the world, but not many people can say they've played a wicked king in a swashbuckling Arthurian special-effects monster movie.

I remember, when we started 'Leverage,' we were all in Chicago, and I read the script for the pilot and thought, 'Boy, this is just a real interesting place to begin a character.' I had to figure out how to go about playing someone who had hit rock bottom.

I would be sad if it ended now. It's been the best job I've had by a long shot, especially creatively because the writing is so good. Every week I get the script and I laugh out loud and get excited for the different stuff we get to do.

Knowing that Gene and Morgan were playing those roles made it much easier to put the script together-we knew who we were writing it for. It took some mystery away.

If a script comes together, and you end up liking the people who are part of it, that's when you can make magic happen. It's a huge combination of trying to find something you think you can deliver on and a director you think you can collaborate with to make a good picture.

Most actors go, 'I read the script and fell in love with it'; I fall in love with the directors.

First off, from reading the script and knowing that I was going to be apart of it, I'm a huge 'Wizard of Oz' fan so to be involved in something that was connected to the original books was really exciting for me and it was very different than anything I had ever worked on before.

The truth is, a director wins an Oscar for a writer's script and actors' performances.

Tone is so important because you can have a great script just be ruined with the wrong director - if they shtick it up or something. With 'Little Miss Sunshine,' I was so concerned they weren't going to play the pageant official realistically because you don't have to wink to play those kinds of characters.

I've read the 'Public Enemies' script and, no, it's not 100 percent historically accurate. But it's by far the closest thing to fact Hollywood has attempted, and for that, I am both excited and quietly relieved.

I have been waiting around to get the right script and the right director. For example, in the past, if a Hollywood director came to me with a script and wanted me to play a character, and she was a stereotypical Asian woman who gets into a fight and gets killed off quickly, that didn't seem to have much interest for me.

I would love to write a script where the main character is a woman. I know I can direct a film where the main character is a woman. I cannot write that film.

The only description for Nolan in the script was that he's a very bad dresser. I put on a red windbreaker and every other ugly, ill-fitting thing I could dig out. He was potentially written as a clean-cut nerd, but I wanted a darker spin.

I take a script and mull over it and underline the bits I want to emphasize. When I go to the set, I know exactly what I want to do.

I first came across the script for 'Macbeth' between the ages of 11 and 12; it was the first book that shook my life. Because I did not yet understand that I could simply purchase it in a bookstore, I copied much of it by hand and took it home. My childhood imagination pushed me to feel like a co-author of the play.

What I look for in a script is the plot point and whether they're strong, obviously, or not, whether the characters are rich or not, and if I can do justice to the character or not. Some movies you look at and the script is so bad that no one can do anything with the script.

I am a fan of all genres. My big thing is to serve the purpose of the script and what the director wants. If it's a comedy, I want to be funny; if it's action, I want to bring the action. If it's drama, I want to be the catalyst for that drama. That's the fun part; it never gets boring being an actor.

In a way, the whole notion of a blueprint of a building is not that different from a script for a movie. A sequence of spaces, which is what you do as an architect, is really the same as a sequence of scenes.

For me, I need to fully immerse myself in a script to the point where I'm literally locking myself away for weeks at a time and I just write it. So I can write twelve to fifteen hours in a day, with breaks in between, obviously, but I need to just sort of live within the world of the script.

All this flying around got on my nerves. But then I gave the script to Cathy to get her opinion. When she started to laugh, it was like 'That's it!'. I went to LA and I got the part.

I've always felt that in a comedy script the stage directions should also have a comedic value.

The green-light meeting, when I first started at Paramount, would consist of maybe three or four of us in a room. Perhaps two or three of us would have read the script under discussion.

You can't do things for money. You just can't act them. There's gotta be something about the script that you really want to do. I wouldn't do a job if I didn't think I could do the best work I possibly could.

To try to create a character without a whole lot of information can be taxing. At the same time, it's fun to just stay on your toes and let the next bit of dialogue come in, and turn the page as you read the next script and see what they have in store for you next.

You never know when you read a script how it's going to turn out because so much depends on the collaboration between people. If I'd been in some of the movies I turned down, maybe they wouldn't have been a success.

When I get a new script my mom will read them and just be aghast. I think it's hysterical.

When I write a play, and we read it for the first time, the great fear is that everybody is going to say, 'You're a bum and you can't write. This stinks.' and throw the script in the garbage. The great hope is that they're all going to lift me up on their shoulders and carry me to the streets, singing, 'He's a genius, he's a genius!'

It often takes a couple of years to get a script right and then takes a couple of years to get financing together.

I'm the only person who's ever opened the Oscars or done a spot on the Oscars without a script and having it on autocue.

My very, very first professional job was when I was 19 years old - I got a job doing an educational industrial film on Shell Motor Oil's oil products. I really put my heart into it - I wrote a script for it, I did a lot of research.

Any time that we read a script and the 'Leverage' team has to infiltrate a place, assume identities, or become con artists ourselves to take down the really bad con artists, it's always fun to do that.

It feels very, very good to make a film freely, to work without having to wait years for script approval, without looking over your shoulder.

When 'Hung' got canceled, I was available for pilot season, and 'Arrow' was the first thing I auditioned for. It wasn't the first script that came to me, but it was my first audition.

I think that whenever there's a good script we try to make that happen, but it's all based off of a good story, a good script, but I don't believe you should do it just because it's African-American.

Unfortunately, the public might not know that we get a script usually two days before shooting. So sometimes I'm shooting an episode and don't even know how it's going to end because I haven't read that yet.

We start 'The Butler' in June and that's incredibly exciting for me because I get to work with the amazing Forest Whitaker again. It's a phenomenal script and a great, great role - I play his son. Oprah Winfrey is his wife and my mother. My character is a radical civil rights activist.

With some writers, the script looks beautiful on the page, but nobody actually speaks like that.

But my family's really close and I was interested in what Mommy and Daddy did for a living. So when Mommy and Daddy had a script that wasn't totally age inappropriate, they would let me read it. And we would talk about it.

As a teenager, in my songbook, I used to script what my lighting would be like. I used to dance in my roo;, it was like putting myself in a trance, and making myself feel good about things, almost like a private ceremony of begging people to like you.

Shooting in Hong Kong, you can do whatever you want, even change the script every day. In Hollywood, you have to have a lot of meetings.

I discovered that, in order to write a magnificent piece, you should shoot the images because once you are filming, you are writing the script in your mind.