Harold Ramis Quotes - Page 4

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• Somebody once told me that if you laugh at a George Bush joke, or you send an email cartoon to your friends that makes Bush look like a fool, you feel like you've done something significant. But really, what have you actually done? Just expressing contempt for your leaders doesn't really accomplish anything.

  Harold Ramis

  Laughing, Leader, Cartoon

  Interview with Eric Spitznagel, believermag.com. March 1, 2006.

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• I can't imagine a successful comedy movie without a successful comedy performance at the heart of it.

  Harold Ramis

  Heart, Successful, Comedy

  Source: www.avclub.com

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• The comic edge of Ghostbusters will always be the same. It's still treating the supernatural with a totally mundane sensibility. In the world of ghostbusting, there are certain givens. You're always going to have some new invented technology, some pseudo-science that sounds right because we drop enough familiar terms from physics and engineering, and pseudo-methodology, something that people will think they may have read something about before.

  Harold Ramis

  Thinking, Technology, Engineering

  Source: www.avclub.com

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• I always think that the writer is doing the vast majority of the director's work, in a sense. If you're a writer who is also going to direct, you're doing all your preparation: You're already visualizing everything, you're imagining how the lines are going to be read, you see the blocking in your head, and you know the rhythm and the pacing.

  Harold Ramis

  Block, Thinking, Preparation

  Source: www.avclub.com

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• It's a great luxury for me to be able to write on the films that I direct, and kind of a nice thing to be able to write enough to get credit, which is difficult for a director.

  Harold Ramis

  Nice, Writing, Luxury

  Source: www.avclub.com

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• When you're a big enough part of the process that the Writers Guild gives you a lot of credit, that's a good thing. It tells me that I've had a significant impact on the film as a writer.

  Harold Ramis

  Impact, Giving, Credit

  Source: www.avclub.com

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• Groundhog Day was pretty clean. It may have to do with some puritanical feeling that comedy is a forbidden pleasure in a certain way. They make you laugh, and laughter is somehow an inferior emotion to tragedy.

  Harold Ramis

  Laughter, Groundhog Day, Laughing

  Source: www.avclub.com

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• At a certain point, you have to convince the actors that you've done the right thing. The way I work, if I can't convince them, I've got to move on. I can't coerce them or browbeat them.

  Harold Ramis

  Moving, Actors, Done

  Source: www.avclub.com

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• I've got to find a compromise where I don't feel compromised. I've got to find something equally good that they don't feel uncomfortable with. At a certain point, it's no longer about what I thought was right, but it's about this new discovery that happens with the actors. It's nice when the actor is also a writer.

  Harold Ramis

  Nice, Discovery, Actors

  Source: www.avclub.com

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• When a director writes, there's a compulsory arbitration. You have a right to challenge any of the arbitrators, but they pick three of four arbitrators who read all the drafts with no names attached and then allocate credit.

  Harold Ramis

  Writing, Names, Challenges

  Source: www.avclub.com

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• The rule of thumb for a director or producer - which prevents them from just sticking their names on everything - is that you have to contribute substantially more than 50 percent of the character dialogue and story.

  Harold Ramis

  Character, Names, Directors

  Source: www.avclub.com

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• I think satire is a luxury of literate middle-class people. People who are well fed and relatively secure in their beds can laugh at their troubles. They can enjoy sitcoms. For those who aren't quite so lucky, well, the irony might be lost on them.

  Harold Ramis

  Thinking, Class, Luxury

  Source: www.believermag.com

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• There's something very edgy about Bill Murray out there improvising.

  Harold Ramis

  Bills, Improvising, Edgy

  Source: www.avclub.com

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• I'm thinking of doing a marital comedy for one of the studios, but I want it to be so painful that it'll have a profound effect on married couples who see it together.

  Harold Ramis

  Couple, Thinking, Profound

  Source: www.ericspitznagel.com

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• I want to explore marriage without the usual Hallmark Card platitudes. Life is difficult, and I like movies that acknowledge that.

  Harold Ramis

  Usual, Cards, Want

  Source: www.ericspitznagel.com

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• Some people have a fear of rejecting all the security that comes with family, church and state. They become fundamentalists.

  Harold Ramis

  People, Church, States

  Source: www.ericspitznagel.com

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• The child says, "Well geesh, the institutions that I'm supposed to respect - the church and the government - they're telling me things that don't appear to be true. Either I'm crazy or they're crazy." That creates the Absurd Child. The Absurd Child is one who says, "Well, I think they're crazy." So you live in this state of alienation from your culture and your society and your family because you see this rampant bullshit around you.

  Harold Ramis

  Children, Crazy, Thinking

  Source: www.ericspitznagel.com

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• The trick with sequels is, you have to give people what they liked before, yet be innovative enough so they don't feel like they're seeing the same movie.

  Harold Ramis

  People, Giving, Enough

  Source: www.avclub.com

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• The comic impulse is sometimes a reaction to sadness. You feel like you can make one choice or the other.

  Harold Ramis

  Sadness, Choices, Sometimes

  Source: www.ericspitznagel.com

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• When you grow up in Chicago, your whole family is counting on you to go to college and do something distinguished. The last thing you're thinking is that you're going to make a career in show business.

  Harold Ramis

  Growing Up, College, Thinking

  Source: www.ericspitznagel.com

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• I loved writing and performing, but the idea of doing it for a living seemed so remote. But I eventually let it devolve to the point where it was the only thing I could do.

  Harold Ramis

  Writing, Ideas, Performing

  Source: www.ericspitznagel.com

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• I've always had that overweening desire to be liked by the audience.

  Harold Ramis

  Desire, Audience

  Source: www.ericspitznagel.com

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• As an actor, you're completely at the mercy of other people. You basically go begging for the opportunity to work. As a writer, at least nobody can tell me what to do. I can write what I want. I might not sell it, but at least I'm in control.

  Harold Ramis

  Writing, Opportunity, People

  Interview with Eric Spitznagel, believermag.com. March 1, 2006.

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• I'm sure that the liability for doing a tracheotomy would be tremendous. You make one mistake, and it's over. Most doctors won't even do it.

  Harold Ramis

  Mistake, Doctors, Would Be

  Source: www.ericspitznagel.com

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• I have tons of rescuing fantasies based on the movies I saw when I was growing up. I wanted to be Robin Hood and the Three Musketeers and the Scarlet Pimpernel.

  Harold Ramis

  Growing Up, Robins, Three

  Source: www.ericspitznagel.com

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