You know, young actors say all the time, 'Should I use my own life experience?' And my response is, 'What choice do you have?'

- David Mamet

The audience requires not information but drama.

- David Mamet

Worry is interest paid in advance on a debt that never comes due.

- David Mamet

We all die in the end, but there's no reason to die in the middle.

- David Mamet

When you come into the theatre, you have to be willing to say, 'We're all here to undergo a communion, to find out what the hell is going on in this …

- David Mamet

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 th…

- David Mamet

Liberalism is a religion. Its tenets cannot be proved, its capacity for waste and destruction demonstrated. But it affords a feeling of spiritual rec…

- David Mamet

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

- David Mamet

The main question in drama, the way I was taught, is always, 'What does the protagonist want?' That's what drama is. It comes down to that. It's not …

- David Mamet