Screenwriters Quotes

• You sell a screenplay like you sell a car. If someone drives it off a cliff, that's it.

  Rita Mae Brown

  Car, Cliffs, Like You

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• If you're just creative, you'll always have to rely on technical people. If you're creative and technical, you're unstoppable.

  Robert Rodriguez

  Creativity, People, Creative

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• Tragedy is a close-up; comedy, a long shot.

  Buster Keaton

  Funny, Humorous, Long

  "Biography/Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• Tagore once said - art has to be beautiful, but, before that, it has to be truthful.

  Ritwik Ghatak

  Beautiful, Art, Truth

  "Cinema and I" by Ritwik Ghatak, (pp. 75), 1987.

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• When I was young, I believed in three things: Marxism, the redemptive power of cinema, and dynamite. Now I just believe in dynamite.

  Sergio Leone

  Funny, Movie, Humorous

  Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.

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• When you hit a wall – of your own imagined limitations – just kick it in.

  Sam Shepard

  Motivational, Moving On, Success

  "Remembering Sam Shepard: The Pulitzer-Winning Playwright and Author's 10 Best Quotes on Writing, Love and Life" by Olivia Ladd, parade.com. July 31, 2017.

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• Here's my unsolicited advice to any aspiring screenwriters who might be reading this: Don’t ever agonize about the hordes of other writers who are ostensibly your competition. No one else is capable of doing what you do.

  Diablo Cody

  Reading, Advice, Competition

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• A lot of college graduates approach me about becoming screenwriters. I tell them, 'Do not become a screenwriter, become a journalist,' because journalists go into worlds that are not their own. Kids who go to Hollywood write coming-of-age stories for their first scripts, about what happened to them when they were sixteen. Then they write the summer camp script. At the age of twenty-three they haven't produced anything, and that's the end of the career.

  Nora Ephron

  Summer, Writing, Kids

  "Nora on Hollywood: In Her Own Words", www.hollywoodreporter.com. July 10, 2012.

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• I started writing morning pages just to keep my hand in, you know, just because I was a writer and I didn't know what else to do but write. And then one day as I was writing, a character came sort of strolling in and I realized, Oh my God, I don't have to be just a screenwriter. I can write novels.

  Julia Cameron

  Morning, Writing, Character

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• I counted it up once. I think I have written 45 full screenplays. Of those, maybe 15 have been shot, in some form. That's a pretty good track record, but it's not 100%. It is frustrating that, as a screenwriter, I've seen all those movies and they don't exist in the real world. They're juts inside my head and on those pages.

  John August

  Real, Thinking, Track

  Source: collider.com

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• One of the things when you write, well the way I write, is that you are writing your scenario and there are different roads that become available that the characters could go down. Screenwriters will have a habit of putting road blocks up against some of those roads because basically they can't afford to have their characters go down there because they think they are writing a movie or trying to sell a script or something like that. I have never put that kind of imposition on my characters. Wherever they go I follow.

  Quentin Tarantino

  Block, Writing, Character

  "Inglourious Basterds - Quentin Tarantino interview". Interview with Rob Carnevale, www.indielondon.co.uk.

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• Stories are a different kind of true.

  Emma Donoghue

  Truth, Writing, Different

  Emma Donoghue (2015). “Room: Picador Classic”, p.55, Pan Macmillan

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• When you know my love, my love will warm you.

  Ruby Dee

  Love, Romantic, Loving Someone

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• A person is, among all else, a material thing, easily torn and not easily mended.

  Ian Mcewan

  People, Novelists, Vulnerable

  "Atonement". Book by Ian McEwan, 2001.

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• 

  Don't keep a man guessing too long - he's sure to find the answer somewhere else.

  Mae West

  Funny, Relationship, Sexy

  Mae West (1967). “The wit and wisdom of Mae West”

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• Love is an act of endless forgiveness, a tender look which becomes a habit.

  Peter Ustinov

  Love, Life, Marriage

  "Ustinov's comic touch". BBC obituary, news.bbc.co.uk. March 29, 2004.

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• Texas women have an amazing sense of purpose when they lose it. They're the best girls in the world - they're loyal and fun, but when they get mad, they'll try to kill you.

  John Cusack

  Girl, Fun, Women

  "Being John Cusack". Interview with Andrew Goldman, www.elle.com. November 23, 2009.

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• Men are like steel. When they lose their temper, they lose their worth.

  Chuck Norris

  Inspirational, Humorous, Anger

  Chuck Norris (2014). “The Official Chuck Norris Fact Book: 101 of Chuck's Favorite Facts and Stories”, p.102, Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.

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• It's a sign of mediocrity when you demonstrate gratitude with moderation.

  Roberto Benigni

  Inspirational, Happiness, Thank You

  "Talking Shop At Oscar Time". Interview with Kenneth L. Woodward, www.newsweek.com. July 2, 1999.

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• Sometimes the person who is the most logical is the person whom we call insane.

  Kevin Spacey

  Funny, Crazy, Humorous

  "Biography/Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• Behind every great man is a woman rolling her eyes.

  Jim Carrey

  Funny, Laughter, Women

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• I would love to see more women directors because they represent half of the population and gave birth to the whole world. Without them the rest [of the world] are not getting to know the whole story.

  Jane Campion

  Women, Writing, Feminist

  "Wanted: female film-makers" by Viv Groskop, www.theguardian.com. May 19, 2009.

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• Read. Read. Read. Just don't read one type of book. Read different books by various authors so that you develop different styles.

  R. L. Stine

  Inspirational, Inspiring, Book

  "Biography/Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• Lies are neither bad nor good. Like a fire they can either keep you warm or burn you to death, depending on how they're used.

  Max Brooks

  Lying, Fire, Deceit

  Max Brooks (2006). “World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War”, p.166, Broadway Books

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• A Message to Children Who Have Read This Book - When you grow up and have children of your own, do please remember something important: a stodgy parent is no fun at all. What a child wants and deserves is a parent who is SPARKY.

  Roald Dahl

  Children, Growing Up, Fun

  "Danny, the Champion of the World". Book by Roald Dahl, 1975.

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