Julie Taymor Quotes

The idea that all violence in movies is okay simply because it happens is bull. Directors and writers have a responsibility.

I'm not going to spend two years on a film or four years on an opera if I don't feel like I can put my own self into it. That doesn't mean it has to be about myself.

Because my parents had given me tremendous respect, trust, and freedom as a child, I knew how to take responsibility for myself. If you're constantly being told "No, don't do that" or "We don't trust you," you can't develop that responsibility.

Creativity is a gift, but if you don't know how to use it you might not even know it's there. There's a lot of creativity in the air, but it's meaningless if you're not open to receiving it.

Limitations force you to find the essence of what you want to say, which is one of the most important things to know for an artist.

Going to the Far East was my first eye-opener to a world vastly different from my own. Then when I was 16 I lived in Paris for a year and studied mime. At 21 I went to Indonesia. I had planned to go for three months, but I stayed four years. I just got lost in the culture.

I know I'm missing something, but those who have children are missing what I get to do. And frankly, I'm probably missing more of what I don't want than what I do. Some may call me selfish or narcissistic, but I don't want to spend my time going to PTA meetings. The only way I could have children and do the work I do is to have a househusband - and I'm not attracted to a househusband. I'd rather affect children with the work I do.

I received from my experience in Japan an incredible sense of respect for the art of creating, not just the creative product. We're all about the product. To me, the process was also an incredibly important aspect of the total form.

In a way, artists are shamans, facilitators who take what's there, channel it through themselves, then put it out there for people to appreciate.

Some people become dullards, but as children we are all creative. It's in the programming, the socialization, that we lose our sense of play.

An artist is an entertainer, number one - a storyteller who takes people someplace, who gives them what they didn't know they wanted.

I don't want to sound like a heroic woman or to seem full of myself, but I do have a core of trust that I'll figure things out and find my way. And if whatever I try is not a good experience, even that is a good experience. If something turns out lousy, it's interesting.

I'm a firm believer in the idea that theater excels over film and TV in its ability to let people play with poetry.

I am creative in my living space - the designer in me helps that out.

I love directing Shakespeare on film. It's fantastic that the actors would do exactly the same thing and be true to their part.

My God, it transformed me. My life changed.

I really do believe that if you don't challenge yourself and risk failing, that it's not interesting.

I have never had a problem with people not being able to understand the words and the meanings in Titus.

You know, I went to Oberlin. At that time, grades were - you elected to have them or not. It was all of that era where grades were out the window. But I did very well in school. I didn't really study the arts; I practiced the arts.

I saw bubbling lava, and at the same moment I saw a reflection of a certain kind of inner turmoil. Because at the moment I looked into that crater, I slipped, and a large piece of volcanic rock took a hole out of my leg. The scar is still there 20, 30 years later. But it's one of those things that reminds you of the kind of risk or the kind of moment in order to push yourself.

My aesthetic is not a Disney aesthetic at all, but when I met with the wonderful producers at Disney, they weren't looking for me to do their aesthetic. I'd already spent 20 years in the theater, so if they were going to hire me, they'd be hiring me for what I have to offer.

In America, the word art has become like the word adultery. It's this big scarlet letter. When you say you're an artist, people are like, "Ugh."

I want to experience a performance on all levels - I want goose bumps and I want to leave the movie or play arguing about something that's unresolved.