Latest Robert Benton Quotes from Interviews

• Movie narration in the forties was radically different than the narrative involved in books.

  Robert Benton

  Book, Narrative, Different

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• Having one perfect thing was less important than having a range of ideas, realizing they were all taking you in a certain direction.

  Robert Benton

  Ideas, Perfect, Important

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• I couldn't sit down and write a novel or a short story - even now - because of my dyslexia. But I learned narration through movies.

  Robert Benton

  Writing, Down And, Stories

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• It's interesting that there are places that words can't get to.

  Robert Benton

  Interesting

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• Sometimes other people have better ideas.

  Robert Benton

  Ideas, People, Sometimes

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• Beauty doesn't have anything to do with prettiness. Beauty has to do with something else; it gets into an area where words can't go.

  Robert Benton

  Prettiness, Areas

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• Style lasts forever and taste doesn't.

  Robert Benton

  Forever, Style, Lasts

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• Taste has nothing to do with style.

  Robert Benton

  Style, Taste

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• Style is the most ephemeral thing I know. It's not about how effective you are it's about how you are effective.

  Robert Benton

  Style, Ephemeral, Knows

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• Style and taste do not have anything to do with the other. It's the difference between wit and humor.

  Robert Benton

  Differences, Style, Taste

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• Style is a way of talking about yourself.

  Robert Benton

  Talking, Style, Way

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• The greatest style is when you can't see the style though you walk away knowing it was there. It's like a perfume - there but not there.

  Robert Benton

  Knowing, Style, Perfume

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• After the war, photography came alive, in part because everybody started to use the 35mm camera, and worked on the street instead of in a studio, and that made an enormous difference in not only how photographs looked, but what they were about.

  Robert Benton

  Photography, War, Differences

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• People who go for humor are wonderful because they do great humor. People who go for wit and end up with humor are people who have made a mistake.

  Robert Benton

  Mistake, People, Wonderful

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• Style tells you a lot more about the truth than substance, because it comes at the truth in an oblique way, it comes in on a slant, it doesn't tell you what it is. It's unexpected and it makes you laugh and think.

  Robert Benton

  Thinking, Laughing, Style

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• The thing I loved the most about being art director was picking the photographers and working with them.

  Robert Benton

  Art, Directors, Photographer

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• Every since high school I've been drawn to magazines.

  Robert Benton

  School, High School, Magazines

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• I was dyslexic as a child and it took me years to get passed that. I read a lot but it was hard and that didn't go away until my early-to-mid-twenties. So really what I was looking at were the photographs and the illustrations in magazines.

  Robert Benton

  Children, Illustration, Years

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• Although I had a few jobs that I didn't like, or quit, or got fired from, I really loved New York from the moment I got here and I never stopped.

  Robert Benton

  Jobs, New York, Quitting

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• There was a kind of cultural life in New York that wasn't as solidified as it is now, it wasn't as money-driven. If you look at the size of the successful art galleries compared to the size of galleries now - there was no such thing as the Gagosian Gallery or Pace Gallery. But it was a time when magazines were a vital part of American life, and Esquire gave me a free pass to every world - I could get to the art world, the theater world, the movie world. It allowed you to roam through the cultural life of New York City.

  Robert Benton

  Art, New York, Successful

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• New York was big enough and wide enough that it allowed for reasonably eccentric people like me to thrive. It was a perfect place for me.

  Robert Benton

  New York, People, Perfect

  Source: classic.esquire.com

• Everybody thought New York was this hard, cruel place, and I found it to be an extraordinarily wonderful place filled with the most interesting people.

  Robert Benton

  New York, People, Interesting

  Source: classic.esquire.com

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