When I started out I was a failed actor.

Each culture has its own form of staged combat, evolved from its particular method of street fighting and cleaned up for presentation as a spectacle, e.g. savate, Cornish wrestling, karate, kung-fu.

"Based on a true story" is a come-on, the aesthetic equivalent of "no loan request refused." For, at best, the creator has fashioned a film based on his understanding of, interpretation of, and reduction of the report of an actual occurrence.

War is tragedy. The great war stories are tragedies. It's the failure of diplomacy. 'War and Peace,' 'A Farewell to Arms,' 'For Whom the Bell Tolls.' Those are some of the greatest tragedies.

You know, young actors say all the time, 'Should I use my own life experience?' And my response is, 'What choice do you have?'

The terror and beauty of the dream come from the connection of previously unrelated mundanities of life.

When we leave the play saying how spectacular the sets or costumes were, or how interesting the ideas, it means we had a bad time.