The quality I most admire in a man is steadfastness.

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.

If you want to be happy, be so.

Nothing you can lose by dying is half so precious as the readiness to die which is man's charter of nobility.

It takes an earthquake to remind us that we walk on the crust of an unfinished planet.

You are perfect, whole and complete. You needn't add anything to yourself to experience your true power.

Medical experts now estimate that 80 percent of diseases are directly linked to frantic living.

I've always been against trying to make a movie like another movie. That's lame. It's already been done, so why do it again?

As a teacher I realize that what one learns in school doesn't serve for very much at all, that the only thing one can really learn is self understanding and this is something that can't be taught.

A warrior is always aware of what is worth fighting for. He does not go into combat over things that do not concern him, and he never wastes his time over provocations.

Like a chastity belt, the package tour keeps you out of mischief but a bit restive for wondering what you missed.

Forgiveness does not require us to close our eyes but rather to truly open them.