An icon painter starts not with Jesus Christ but by finding earth and rubbing. Now what is earth, what are you rubbing in directing?

Time, which is so often an enemy in life, can also become our ally if we see how a pale moment can lead to a glowing moment, and then turn to a moment of perfect transparency, before dropping again to a moment of everyday simplicity.

Preparing a character is the opposite of building-it is a demolishing, removing brick by brick everything in the actor's muscles, ideas and inhibitions that stands between him and the part, until one day, with a great rush of air, the character invades his every pore.

An icon painter starts not with Jesus Christ but by finding earth and rubbing. Now what is earth, what are you rubbing in directing?

Theatres, actors, critics and public are interlocked in a machine that creaks but never stops. There is always a new season in hand and we are to busy to ask the only vital question which measures the whole structure. Why theatre at all? What for? Is it an anachronism, a superannuated oddity? Surviving like an old monument or a quaint custom? Why do we applaud and what? Has the stage a real place in our lives? What function can it have? What could it serve? What could it explore? What are its special properties?

A word does not start as a word – it is an end product which begins as an impulse, stimulated by attitude and behaviour which dictates the need for expression.

The closeness of reality and the distance of myth, because if there is no distance you aren't amazed, and if there is no closeness you aren't moved.