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

  Buster Keaton

  Funny, Humorous, Long

  "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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• 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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• 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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• 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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• It's very hard to be a screenwriter. I remember getting a couple of awards. I got a PEN West award a million years ago when I did Running on Empty, and I sat in the room with all these writers. They wrote everything from novels to non-fiction to children's books to journalism - any kind of writing - and I realized that there was no one in the room who would ever read anything I'd written.

  Naomi Foner Gyllenhaal

  Running, Children, Couple

  "Naomi Foner and the Importance of Being Earnest". Interview with Emma Brown, www.interviewmagazine.com. July 22, 2014.

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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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• The witching hour, somebody had once whispered to her, was a special moment in the middle of the night when every child and every grown-up was in a deep deep sleep, and all the dark things came out from hiding and had the world all to themselves.

  Roald Dahl

  Children, Sleep, Dark

  Roald Dahl (2016). “Roald Dahl's Scrumdiddlyumptious Story Collection: Six Marvellous Stories Including The BFG and Five Other Stories”, p.533, Penguin UK

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• The best moments in reading are when you come across something - a thought, a feeling, a way of looking at things - which you had thought special and particular to you. And now, here it is, set down by someone else, a person you have never met, someone even who is long dead. And it is as if a hand has come out, and taken yours

  Alan Bennett

  Inspirational, Motivational, Reading

  The History Boys, www.imdb.com. 2006.

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• I think what's important for kids to know is that your decisions here on earth matter, your behavior matters and how you treat other people matters.

  Matt Damon

  Inspirational, Children, Kids

  "Matt Damon: I Want to 'Raise My Four Girls to Be Strong Women' " by Jeanne Wolf, parade.com. October 21, 2010.

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• Keep passing the open windows.

  John Irving

  Life, Depression, Encouraging

  FaceBook post by John Irving from Aug 06, 2014

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  It wasn't until I started reading and found books they wouldn't let us read in school that I discovered you could be insane and happy and have a good life without being like everybody else.

  John Waters

  Inspirational, Life, Happiness

  Interview with Scott Tobias, www.avclub.com. August 16, 2000.

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  You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. What you'll discover will be wonderful. What you'll discover is yourself.

  Alan Alda

  Inspirational, Motivational, Change

  Alan Alda's commencement speech at Connecticut College in New London, www.graduationwisdom.com. 1980.

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• The best love is the kind that awakens the soul and makes us reach for more, that plants a fire in our hearts and brings peace to our minds. And that's what you've given me. That's what I'd hoped to give you forever

  Nicholas Sparks

  Love, Best Friend, Romantic

  FaceBook post by Nicholas Sparks from Oct 31, 2011

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• Courage is like a muscle. We strengthen it by use.

  Ruth Gordon

  Inspirational, Motivational, Strength

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• I'm not living the life I thought I would lead, but it does have meaning, purpose. There is love... there is joy... there is laughter.

  Christopher Reeve

  Love, Life, Laughter

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• The only way love can last a lifetime is if it's unconditional. The truth is this: love is not determined by the one being loved but rather by the one choosing to love.

  Stephen Kendrick

  Love, Relationship, Truth

  Alex Kendrick, Stephen Kendrick (2013). “The Love Dare”, p.46, B&H Publishing Group

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• Every scene should be able to answer three questions: "Who wants what from whom? What happens if they don't get it? Why now?"

  David Mamet

  Three, Answers, Want

  "Crossings: David Mamet’s Work in Different Genres and Media". Book by Johan Callens, 2009.

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• The Voice There is a voice inside of you That whispers all day long, "I feel this is right for me, I know that this is wrong." No teacher, preacher, parent, friend Or wise man can decide What's right for you--just listen to The voice that speaks inside.

  Shel Silverstein

  Inspirational, Life, Wise

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  As a writer, I demand the right to write any character in the world that I want to write. I demand the right to be them, I demand the right to think them and I demand the right to tell the truth as I see they are.

  Quentin Tarantino

  Truth, Writing, Character

  "The Quentin Tarantino race debate isn't black and white" by Steve Rose, www.theguardian.com. October 13, 2015.

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• Some people turn sad awfully young. No special reason, it seems, but they seem almost to be born that way. They bruise easier, tire faster, cry quicker, remember longer and, as I say, get sadder younger than anyone else in the world. I know, for I'm one of them.

  Ray Bradbury

  Sad, People, Special

  FaceBook post by Ray Bradbury from Jan 16, 2017

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