Quotes on Screenwriting

If a story doesn't give you a hard-on in the first couple of scenes, throw it in the goddamned garbage.

As a writer, I demand the right to write any character in the world that I want to write. I demand the right to be them, I demand the right to think them and I demand the right to tell the truth as I see they are.

I would love to see more women directors because they represent half of the population and gave birth to the whole world. Without them the rest [of the world] are not getting to know the whole story.

Film’s thought of as a director’s medium because the director creates the end product that appears on the screen. It’s that stupid auteur theory again, that the director is the author of the film. But what does the director shoot-the telephone book? Writers became much more important when sound came in, but they’ve had to put up a valiant fight to get the credit they deserve.

All writing is discipline, but screenwriting is a drill sergeant.

It's possible for me to make a bad movie out of a good script, but I can't make a good movie from a bad script.

The script is what you`ve dreamed up - this is what it should be. The film is what you end up with.

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

I think if I've worked anything through with screenwriting it's that I'm not going to be able to work anything through.

I tend to jot down moments, lines, interactions that don't really make any sense. I try and explain these scattered notes to my close friends, and they become more and more logical. I see screenwriting as a bit like a math equation which I have to solve.

There's nothing more important in making movies than the screenplay.

The challenge of screenwriting is to say much in little and then take half of that little out and still preserve an effect of leisure and natural movement

Cheat your landlord if you can -- and must -- but do not try to shortchange the Muse.