Quotes About Directors

I watched a lot of silent directors who were absolutely great like John Ford and Fritz Lang, Tod Browning, and also some very modern directors like The Coen Brothers. The directors take the freedom within their own movies to be melodramatic or funny when they chose to be. They do whatever they want and they don't care about the genre.

I can't imagine any director directing a screenplay of mine, because the great directors all have very personal styles, and the ones that don't are not very interesting directors.

The hardest thing for a film actor, especially if you are in a lot of the film, is sustaining energy for the entire length of a production. It's quite tough. With acting, it's not the same as directing. Directors work the exact same hours; directing is incredibly exhausting. The only difference is that directors aren't required to have bursts of energy and focus. They're probably focused the entire day. Actors have this thing of "stop/start." That can be quite draining, actually.

Some directors are very free and some directors are very specific. It seemed like doing a play.

As you're growing up, it's odd, because directors don't expect you to grow up. They think you'll be young forever, but as an actor, there is an awkward period when you're too young for old or too old for young, and it can be an odd time.

I think film is a world of directors. Theater is a world of actors.

Sometimes the directors were afraid of what they brought out of me.

There are directors who desire to be artistic. It is pathetic to compare the seriousness of their aim with the absurdity of their attainment.

I guess the story that best defines us [with Bud Yorkin] and our relationship goes back to the [Dean] Martin and [Jerry] Lewis show. The four stage managers on that show became major TV creators and directors - John Rich, Jack Smight, Arthur Penn and Bud Yorkin.

Being a producer, I deal with a lot of different directors, and some of them would drive me insane with all the different histrionics, and the mystique that they carry.

I've certainly worked with really great directors who haven't acted.

I never storyboard. I hate it. I don't understand why so many directors want to make comic strips of their films.

Julie Taymor. She is my gold standard of stage directors. I think she has a comprehensive knowledge of theatrical form, since she lived in Indonesia, Java, Japan and France. Her knowledge of form is limitless. Whenever I get painted in a corner, I think about what form she would use, because that is what she practices. It's about accessing the theater traditions of the whole world.

The best thing an actor can be is flexible, because all directors are different and all actors are different.

I like working with different directors; it keeps you on your toes.

I guess I'm not jaded because I still believe that there are good films out there, and there are great directors, and there are great writers. It just takes a little bit more perseverance and a little bit more time to find [them].

I had been doing summer stock every summer while I was in college. We did a showcase, like most good conservatories do - monologues and things that agents and casting directors come to see. From that I got an agent.

Now that I'm taking some time off from school, I've been reading a lot to make sure I don't forget everything. It's mostly classics and nonfiction accounts from actors, directors and writers from the '40s and '50s

There are some actresses who cannot function on the set without having a close relationship with their directors. Their way of communicating with the director is through intimacy. It doesn't necessarily have to do with any physical act; it has more to do with achieving a closeness that they find very valuable.

Sometimes, with directors, you have to take what they say and translate it in your head, into something that makes sense to you, because you're speaking two different languages.

Every day is still exciting. I have like a very good system worked out with my editor. Some directors are in there every day, sitting there in the room with the editor. I lose perspective incredibly quickly, and so what I do is I watch...I come in the room and give very specific notes and then I go back to my house or in my office and I watch the dailies.

I think part of the fun of being an actor is getting to work with different directors and seeing their take on it, what they're passionate about. They all have different ideas about your character.

As an actress, I think it’s important to look back and realize that we aren’t always quite as original as we think we are. There’s this grand, textured history for us over the last 100 years of incredible writers, directors, and performers.

Of course I am a child of European culture. There are a number of great directors from which I learned, but there is nobody in particular I got inspired from.

I think stupidity in business is really an interesting thing. What winds up happening is a disconnect between your company's strategic management and then your more applied on-the-street management. I guarantee with you that the board of directors of most companies has no idea what the costs of hiring people really is in the HR department.

The directors that I end up having a really good time with are the ones that understand the fluidity of the medium and are interested in catching lightning in a bottle.

Wong Kar-wai and Ang Lee are two Asian directors I'm really fond of.

There are a few directors around who I have some excitement about spending my $7 at the theatre watching their movies.

Women are making strides in many areas and women have mentored and supported me along the way. I think that women are underrepresented behind the camera as directors.

There are lots of good directors I would like to work with; I want to be inspired and challenged by them.

I'm not imprisoned in any one medium. In films I use techniques that are not necessarily what other directors attempt. When I write novels I also use techniques which can run counter to those that a novelist would use.

One of the young production assistants (on 'Terminator: Salvation') stepped over to my chair and said, 'Mr. Ironside, are you any relation to the Ironside who was in 'Top Gun'?' And I said, 'I am, yes.' And she grinned and said, 'I knew it! Talent must run in your family!' And she walked away. And all of the producers and directors kind of looked at me uncertainly, and I said, 'What are you guys so uncomfortable for? That's an incredible compliment. I do look like the father of that guy, for Christ's sake!'

I can count on one hand the directors who actually directed me.

Children of Men is a solemn, haunting picture, but it's also a thrilling one, partly because of the sheer bravado with which it's made. It left me feeling more fortified than drained. [Director Alfonso] Cuarón, the most openhearted of directors, prefers to give rather than take away.

I've had the opportunity to work with so many great directors. Different styles, as well, like Gus Van Sant. He just does the casting and the milieu and let's you do your thing, quietly. Bertolucci, who can talk to you about your internal world in quite a creative way or just say, 'Well, put your hand over here.'

At almost forty years old, I assumed my career on camera was over. And I was certainly given that message by all the TV managers and news directors who passed on me when I was trying to get a job back in the business.

I don't come to work as an actor. There are many directors who can direct without ever having acted and do a great job and connect with their actors and lead them to excellent performances without themselves having had an acting background.

I gotta say, the Catholic Church has churned out a lot of great artists and directors and actors, so if that's all they do, that's fine by me. If they're good at churning out tortured artists, that's great!

As an artist, program directors always want to put you in a little box.

It began when I was so ill that there was a good chance of dying. I promised myself that if I survived I would never again pander to a magazine's requests or follow the ideas of art directors. I would only make images which were personal, which arose out of my own life.

A lot of directors prefer the solitude of the editing process, but I revel in the craziness of what a film set is.

With every movie I produce, I learn something. I watch the directors. It's like the relationship you have with your children. I'm there to learn from my daughters. They are the perfect spirits.

If you work in casting, it's sort of not cool to want to act. A lot of people think that casting directors are frustrated actors, but it wasn't true with any of the casting people I knew.

I always wanted to create a site that was sports and pop culture. 30 for 30 had a big impact because I loved how that was about finding, empowering and working with these incredible directors, and I thought the same thing could work for writers.

I'm really, really happy with what I do for a living. I mean, that's what I consider work, like being on set, bringing a character to life and, you know, working with other actors and directors and stuff.

I miss working with great actors, working with great directors.

...Directors of a large food-manufacturing firm (:)...At one extreme (: one) said it was not his job to protect people from themselves; he was not forcing people to eat his products, and if they chose to do so at the risk of harming themselves, it was of their own free choice.

If a good actor wants a role, they'll do whatever it takes to get the part. Directors are the same. We do 'meetings', not auditions: that tells you a whole lot more about an actor, too.