Latest Edward Norton Quotes from Interviews

Quotes about:

• If you try to make interesting films, you're going to be disappointed most of the time. I choose just not to look at it that way. I don't look at American History X as a failure, or Fight Club as a failure, or 25th Hour as a failure, or Larry Flynt as a failure, or any of the movies that I care about that I've made that were not immediately successful. I'll stand with those movies any day over 90 percent of the movies that came out at the same time that made a hundred million dollars

  Edward Norton

  Successful, Fighting, Interesting

  Source: film.avclub.com

• I think it's a total fallacy for people to say, "You couldn't make those old movies today." I think there's more ways to get a movie made today than ever in the history of the entertainment industry. It's a very exciting time to work in movies, if you're a creative person looking to make a very personal, weird vision.

  Edward Norton

  Thinking, People, Creative

  Source: film.avclub.com

• Everyone thinks that Fight Club is a very important and successful film, but it was a massive box-office failure. Massive. It was a big flop by any commercial-release standard. And it's been a huge hit on DVD. Everything that movie has become has been on DVD. So you can't stake your sense of creative success on this whole box-office-performance matrix, because if you do, you're going to be disappointed most of the time.

  Edward Norton

  Successful, Fighting, Thinking

  Source: film.avclub.com

• You're always choosing the start point and the end point. And almost by definition, the most interesting period is where something happens, as a result of which something is different at the end. And so to me, the idea that you know everything about a character at the beginning is sort of ridiculous. Something has to be revealed. I like it when the deeper you go with the character, the more you see the layers start to peel away. It's more challenging to me, but it's also just interesting. Those are the things I like to watch. I like to watch the evolutions of something.

  Edward Norton

  Character, Interesting, Challenges

  Source: film.avclub.com

• When I look at the directors that I really love, who really develop their films over time, they're almost always the ones who go back again and again and again at the same investigations. I think that when somebody has a theme they go after, it's fun to service that. It's like, "I know you now. I know what you go at." It helps you locate yourself a little bit quicker in their world.

  Edward Norton

  Fun, Thinking, World

  Source: film.avclub.com

• When you're working on a creative thing, everyone has an idea, and they're pushing it. The first time you work with anybody, you have to get comfortable with the way another person pushes hard for what they want. Familiarity breeds contempt, people say. But I've found, for creative things, familiarity breeds peace of mind, because you realize you know someone better. You trust each other. You know not to take things a certain way, or a wrong way. You get to where you don't have to waste quite so much time with diplomacy. Things are a little more efficient.

  Edward Norton

  People, Creative, Mind

  Source: film.avclub.com

• We must realize that nature is absolutely essential for our survival, and we must act on that premise now.

  Edward Norton

  Survival, Essentials, Realizing

• I come from a family of conservation activists, and so I've had a strong connection to nature all my life. My father has been a leader within the movement for over thirty years and has taught most of what I know about environmental conservation. While he would always take me hiking, camping, and rafting, he also taught me that the spiritual value of the outdoors alone is not enough to save nature against economic interests.

  Edward Norton

  Spiritual, Strong, Father

• Even my wife and two of my children are in "Leaves of Grass". Because I love the source material so much, it was really easy to write and an utter delight to get to direct because I had people like Edward [Norton] elevating the material and surprising me in their interpretations of all of this stuff that's so close to me.

  Edward Norton

  Children, Writing, Two

• I'm a Tulsa Jew and I have a religious upbringing.

  Edward Norton

  Religious, Tulsa, Jew

• The Zionist Tulsa Jew who's pugnacious is a reality. I grew up around it. And I think it's really, really funny and surprising and unlikely.

  Edward Norton

  Reality, Thinking, Tulsa

• What we set out to do with this movie [Leaves of Grass] was to create something that was funny and serious and had large tonal ambitions. A movie that could be poignant and funny, and suddenly quite violent. To have a character utterly sideswiped, and to learn that life is about balance.

  Edward Norton

  Ambition, Character, Balance

• I never even considered comedy genre as something to embrace or move away from.

  Edward Norton

  Moving, Comedy, Embrace

• You dream as an actor's director of letting moments breathe through two-shots.

  Edward Norton

  Dream, Two, Directors

• I've never acted before in a movie I've directed. This felt like the time to do it just because the " Leaves of Grass" movie itself is so much of a platform for the lead actor. It's really written for an exciting performance and it really depends on the audience watching an extraordinary actor having a great time pulling off this feat. It makes sense to me as a director to act in support of that.

  Edward Norton

  Support, Actors, Leaves Of Grass

• With Edward Norton you'd never say, "This is the one we're going with whether you like it or not." It has to be agreed upon.

  Edward Norton

  You Like It

• I had a huge advantage with Edward Norton because he's directed a movie before, so one thing he appreciates is how hard my job is, he's very sensitive to that. We actually ended up finishing "Leaves of Grass" a day early.

  Edward Norton

  Jobs, Appreciate, Leaves Of Grass

• Remarkably, there's no green screen in 'Leaves of Grass' movie. There is motion control. Technically, there were all sorts of challenges, but really the soul of it is Edward Norton talent. You write these characters when you write a movie, and all you can hope for or depend on is that your actors will elevate the material.

  Edward Norton

  Character, Writing, Challenges

• Screenplays aren't written to be read, they're written to be made into movies.

  Edward Norton

  Made, Screenplays, Written

• I hear about actors being exterior actors and actors being instinctual actors and I always think it's crap. Anybody who knows anything about it knows that good actors do both - they do inside-outward and they do outside-inward. You can't not do both.

  Edward Norton

  Thinking, Inward, Actors

  "Interview: 'Leaves of Grass' Star Edward Norton and Director Tim Blake Nelson". filmschoolrejects.com. March 28, 2010.

• When you have a pipe salesman with a business called Macabee Pipes, I'd say you've got your tongue planted firmly in your cheek.

  Edward Norton

  Tongue, Pipe, Salesman

  "Interview: 'Leaves of Grass' Star Edward Norton and Director Tim Blake Nelson". Interview with Landon Palmer, filmschoolrejects.com. March 28, 2010.

• I think the consensus among our generation and people younger than us is that we do have a defining challenge in the moment, so I do like being involved in something bigger than the finger-doodling I do in art. It stimulates your brain in certain ways.

  Edward Norton

  Art, Thinking, Our Generation

  "Interview: 'Leaves of Grass' Star Edward Norton and Director Tim Blake Nelson". Interview with Landon Palmer, filmschoolrejects.com. March 28, 2010.

• I like to get into a lot of things besides movies. I've been very involved with a few specific efforts. We built this park in New York and it's been a very successful project... I worked on a conservation project in East Africa... Too much of this type of stuff can get you wrapped up in your own work and I love it.

  Edward Norton

  New York, Successful, Effort

  "Interview: 'Leaves of Grass' Star Edward Norton and Director Tim Blake Nelson". Interview with Landon Palmer, filmschoolrejects.com. March 28, 2010.

• For me there's always a line or two in a script, when you hit it you almost decide to do the whole movie off a line or two. You almost do it for the fun of getting to say a line or two like that. I don't have any specific plans, you know. I mean, if Seth Rogen calls with a great buddy pic, I'll be there.

  Edward Norton

  Fun, Mean, Two

  "Interview: 'Leaves of Grass' Star Edward Norton and Director Tim Blake Nelson". Interview with Landon Palmer, filmschoolrejects.com. March 28, 2010.

• There are things you do for the fun of doing them or to work or to hang with certain people. But the projects that I've invested myself in and cared about most deeply have absolutely been activated by a desire to chase something that I relate to, or that I see as having the potential to speak to someone else directly.

  Edward Norton

  Fun, People, Desire