Latest Keith Johnstone Quotes from Interviews

Quotes about:

• If people had no fear, you'd hardly need to have to teach them. It's the fear that screws everything up.

  Keith Johnstone

  People, Needs, No Fear

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• I mean, in the foreword to Impro in Denmark is by Søren Iversen, who I taught long ago, he was a Danish director, after he left. He said he'd read about [Eugeny] Vakhtangov. I'm a fan of his. When he heard that Vakhtangov had lots of tricks, he thought this was very bad. But when he came to be my student, he realised it was very good to have a lot of tricks. You saw some this morning.

  Keith Johnstone

  Morning, Mean, Long Ago

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• When you want to have entertainment, it must be a waste of time. I don't like that. I don't like improvisation being pointless.

  Keith Johnstone

  Want, Waste, Entertainment

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• You can sort of trick people into being really good. Even if they didn't know anything.

  Keith Johnstone

  People, Being Real, Tricks

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• Light entertainment means it mustn't teach you anything.

  Keith Johnstone

  Mean, Light, Entertainment

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• Very hard to get an audience. So if you're going to fill the theatre, you can't just rely on old stuff.

  Keith Johnstone

  Theatre, Stuff, Audience

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• My feeling is the moment the theatre is not full you have to do something else. But most people somehow think 'If we did it better, they would come'. No. They don't come.

  Keith Johnstone

  Thinking, People, Feelings

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• I left my theatre the Loose Moose almost twenty years ago, and I hardly ever go back. Sometimes I go back to do a Mask class. They're doing more of this than I was doing when I left. Often it's the same improvisers but they're older. And now, they don't care if the theatre's full or not.

  Keith Johnstone

  Years, Class, Theatre

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• Every theatre worth anything has somebody in the middle of it who is driving it; like Joan Littlewood with her theatre.

  Keith Johnstone

  Theatre, Driving, Middle

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• I'm not against work, I think work is great, I work a lot; but if you want to play, the consequences must not be important.

  Keith Johnstone

  Thinking, Play, Important

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• The improvisation had to be in public, because you only get value playing to strangers.

  Keith Johnstone

  Stranger, Improvisation, Values

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• I was crazy about silent comedy - in the old days, and crazy about Japanese movies.

  Keith Johnstone

  Crazy, Comedy, Silent

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• Some people in this life think they're worth something, or that they have a right to things. I never thought I had a right to anything 'cause of the way I was broken as a child. And therefore I was sort of floating around and would get sucked into things.

  Keith Johnstone

  Children, Thinking, People

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• Where if you're in a universe where you have to accept ideas, you'll never know if your partner wanted the garbage you're handing them. They have to take it.

  Keith Johnstone

  Ideas, Garbage, Accepting

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• I see a great lack of stories around. I bought six literary magazines and looked through them to see what people were doing. There wasn't a story in them. They were all about how poetic the feelings of the author were.

  Keith Johnstone

  People, Feelings, Stories

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• In my school, the library was forbidden. I was accused of turning on the radiator so that the [class]room was uninhabitable and the ceiling came down below; I'm pretty sure I didn't do it. But then we were moved to the library. And there was a really boring history thing, about the Spanish Armada: how could you make that boring?!So I reached my hand out, and slid a book off to read under the desk, and it opened at King Lear Act Four Scene Six. I was astounded. I'd never seen language like it. I was awestruck. I think that may be one reason why I got involved in theatre.

  Keith Johnstone

  Kings, Book, School

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• Wherever you go it's the same fear. And the same protective devices. There is one big error I think and partly my fault which is that a lot of things are taught to beginners which you can cast off later on.

  Keith Johnstone

  Thinking, Errors, Beginners

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• Trying to do better is trying to be better than you actually are, and I don't think you can do that.

  Keith Johnstone

  Thinking, Trying, Can Do

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• I tell people not to do their best. I don't know when that started. Quite a while ago. Because I . . . when they're doing their best I don't get their best. So I try to persuade them to be average. Because if you're wonderful and you're average, you're still wonderful. If you're a bad improviser and you're average, you're what you are.

  Keith Johnstone

  Average, People, Trying

  Source: actorsandperformers.com

• The problem's always been to deal with the fear.Cos the fear is pretty . . . it ruins everybody really.

  Keith Johnstone

  Ruins, Problem, Deals

  Source: actorsandperformers.com