Everyone needs money. That's why they call it money

Films have degenerated to their original operation as carnival amusement - they offer not drama but thrills.

The Oscars demonstrate the will of the people to control and judge those they have elected to stand above them (much, perhaps, as in bygone days, an election celebrated the same).

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

When the three branches of government have failed to represent the citizenry and the mass of the media has failed to represent the citizenry, then the citizenry better represent the citizenry.

Forget narrative, backstory, characterisation, exposition, all of that. Just make the audience want to know what happens next.

It is the writer’s job to make the play interesting. It is the actor’s job to make the performance truthful.

Opportunity may knock, but it seldom nags.

We must have a pie. Stress cannot exist in the presence of a pie.

People may or may not say what they mean... but they always say something designed to get what they want.

Being a writer in Hollywood is like going to Hitler's Eagle Nest with a great idea for a bar mitzvah.

Shall we go?' he murmured, perhaps regretting his decision to show me his army of plastic cartoon figurines.

The last thing family and friends want is for you to spend money on them that you don't have or that you can't really spare.

Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.

There is great worth in holding universal truths and timelessly beautiful words in your heart, which will stay there forever, infusing your thoughts and speech.

Not all popular novelists are good, but all good novelists are, sooner or later, popular.

Many of us have read about and talked about forgiveness, and we understand intellectually why it might benefit us to let go of anger toward others. But we hold on anyway.

Mortals are easily tempted to pinch the life out of their neighbour's buzzing glory, and think that such killing is no murder.

As an actor, I look at scenes much differently than I would look at them as a director, and I never realized that until it actually happened.

I see only defects because I'm not following the scene as it were. I'm not following the other person. It's like the best thing to clarify this is the theater.

Reading is alive and well and will get more alive and more well. Reading on tablets (or whatever the next tech device will be) is the future - and the future is now.