Top 100 Kaufman's Quotes
#1. Andy Kaufman's mom wanted a girl, his father wanted a boy, and they were both satisfied!
Jerry Lawler
#2. There are so many people who are making movies now who can't get any kind of distribution, so the market seems like it's flooded.
Charlie Kaufman
#3. It's raining," I say, voice hoarse from sleep. I clear my throat and try again. "It's fine. Straight from the clouds to you."
She frowns, still huddling over and trying to shelter from it. "Straight from the clouds? Is that hygienic?
Amie Kaufman
#4. I met Keith Haring at SVA college where he was having an art show, later we had a group art show at the Mud Club in NYC. Keith owed me $50, so he gave me a large framed canvas with barking dogs that had large dicks. I painted over Keith's painting to paint flowers for my mom's living room.
Steve Kaufman
#6. I do sense that the financial system is under the gun. In order to keep our system and economies moving globally, there's the need to extend new money.
Henry Kaufman
#7. Remember not to forget the dying colors of yesterday
As you inhale tomorrow's hot dream, blown from frozen lips.
Remember, you naked agent of every nothing.
Bob Kaufman
#8. Magicians are definitely more arrogant. They're kind of like "Abra Kadabra, you're an idiot," they don't let you in on the joke. Comedians, you're always in on the joke unless it's Andy Kaufman.
Jim Carrey
#9. When I perform, it's very personal. I'm sharing things I like, inviting the audience into my room.
Andy Kaufman
#10. Pure entertainment is not an egotistical lady singing boring songs onstage for two hours and people in tuxes clapping whether they like it or not. It's the real performers on the street who can hold people's attention and keep them from walking away.
Andy Kaufman
#11. I like the word OLD. Not senior, that's for proms. Older? Older than whom? 'Old' is honorable and ripe
Bel Kaufman
#12. I think if I've worked anything through with screenwriting it's that I'm not going to be able to work anything through.
Charlie Kaufman
#14. Thousands of individuals unknowingly contribute to the creation of our lives. Over the years, these serendipitous exchanges made imprints on my mind and heart and served as catalysts for my ongoing growth and development.
Kristin S. Kaufman
#15. A teacher is frequently the only adult in the pupil's environment who treats him with respect.
Bel Kaufman
#16. But you know, there's always a danger nowadays that films are gonna be brought up to Canada for budget reasons. And that's something that really concerns me.
Philip Kaufman
#18. House guests (I don't care who they are, how much I like them, or how long it's been since I last saw them) are pests, much like roaches and mice. But there are differences. You can trap roaches and mice. And they don't want you to drive them to Disneyland.
Margo Kaufman
#19. It's all I can do not to turn my face toward his, the way a plant grows toward the light.
Amie Kaufman
#20. People ask me all the time, "What are your influences? Are you trying to do Beckett?" It's like, "No, I'm trying to do me." Whatever that is. I don't know what that is, but that's the basis. I'm trying to be true and I'm trying to be honest.
Charlie Kaufman
#21. She may be trained, but I'm fighting for my family, my home, my freedom. She's fighting for a goddamn paycheck.
Amie Kaufman
#22. I like for people to figure things out for themselves. It's not like I have the right answer, but if I have a visceral reaction to something, I'm sure that other people will, too.
Charlie Kaufman
#23. Good teachers, like Tolstoy's happy families, are alike everywhere.
Bel Kaufman
#24. Never mind the cream; it will always rise to the top. It's the skim milk that needs good teachers.
Bel Kaufman
#25. My brain feels like it's running on a treadmill in a pool of tar.
Amie Kaufman
#26. I don't think the world objectively exists the way we think it exists. There's a constant sort of storytelling process.
Charlie Kaufman
#27. Quality is more than a promise, it's genuine performance.
Ron Kaufman
#28. There's no such thing as the very best. If you're doing your best, it's only because you haven't yet found a way to do better.
Ron Kaufman
#29. CLEMENTINE: This is it, Joel. It's going to be gone soon.
JOEL: I know.
CLEMENTINE: What do we do?
JOEL: Enjoy it.
Charlie Kaufman
#30. Here's a curious fact about human beings: we have a really hard time realizing that something isn't there.
Josh Kaufman
#31. It's not about what I say, right? It's what I do that matters here.
Amie Kaufman
#32. Be the exception to the rule. It's the surest way to become exceptional.
Ron Kaufman
#33. I wanted to deal with someone's idea of their relationship.
Charlie Kaufman
#34. My leg hurts, I wonder if it's cancer? There's a bump. I'm starting to sweat. Stop sweating. I've got to stop sweating.
Can she see it dripping down my forehead? She looked at my hair line. She thinks I'm bald.
Charlie Kaufman
#37. After I defended my title the first time when I beat Sarah Kaufman, I went back to my room, and my friend ordered all these trays of hot wings. They came into the room, and the little hotel sheet thing was draped over it, and I go to open it up, and it's breaded and boneless. I cried.
Ronda Rousey
#38. Each one of us has a destiny to fulfill, and a seat to take. It is never to late, as long as we have breath.
Kristin S. Kaufman
#39. I shot a lot of close-ups on this movie 'cause there's like a dual mystery, she's searching through her haunted past to find some truth and she's also following an external mystery where she comes to think she might be the killer.
Philip Kaufman
#40. I think if something resonates, even if it's surreal, it's because it is relatable and I think that that's a core issue for me.
Charlie Kaufman
#41. We're all subjective beings and trapped in our own realities and our own biographical stories and physical bodies and our histories - and that's the only way we can experience the world.
Charlie Kaufman
#42. What's possible today isn't bound by what was possible yesterday, and is never a measure of what's possible tomorrow.
Ron Kaufman
#43. At dramatic rehearsals, the only author that's better than an absent one is a dead one.
George S. Kaufman
#44. People will say things after a screening that it affects them in a certain way, which is why I don't like to explain what certain things are about. I want them to have that. It limits people's ability to understand something if I say it's "about this." That's happened to us a bunch on this.
Charlie Kaufman
#45. Let today's strong performance be your starting point for tomorrow.
Ron Kaufman
#46. The only honest and generous thing for me to do is to give people myself. That's all I've got as an artist, so I want to do that in an unflinching way.
Charlie Kaufman
#47. As I'm writing, I start to see connections, and themes I didn't see, and that sparks other things. So then I go back and rewrite things or alter them. It's a combination of intuition and a lot of finessing. It becomes a combination of the rational and the irrational.
Charlie Kaufman
#48. Stop asking if the glass is half full or half empty. Instead ask "What's in it? How did it get there? What can I do with it?"
David Kaufman
#49. You don't mention death when it's hovering near someone you love. You don't want t attract the reaper's attention.
Amie Kaufman
#50. The true measure of what you put in, is what's received on the other end.
Ron Kaufman
#51. David Lynch is very important to me, and he does dreamlike movies, but my dreams are not like David Lynch's dreams. I have no interest in copying anybody's work. It would never occur to me to want this to look like someone else's thing.
Charlie Kaufman
#52. Children are the true connoisseurs. What's precious to them has no price, only value.
Bel Kaufman
#53. I'll never retire as long as I live - that's like retiring from life! I'll never stop writing, teaching, lecturing. If you're in good health, living is exciting on its own.
Bel Kaufman
#54. She's gazing down at me, Stone-faced Chase, absolutely unforgiving, soot and ashes streaking her face like war paint.
Amie Kaufman
#55. My husband says that I'm afraid of heights, but that's not true. What I'm afraid of is falling.
Margo Kaufman
#56. But this guy ... this guy makes me pause. Makes me forget all of that. Dark, tumbly hair, thick brows, dangerously sweet eyes. Sensuous mouth, tiny smirk barely hidden at its corner. He's got a poets mouth. Artistic, expressive.
Amie Kaufman
#57. And then to see the whole movie, you're pretty much waiting until the end of production. And the major lifting in terms of editing and all that stuff is done before you shoot the movie. That's an unusual way to work.
Charlie Kaufman
#58. Do what's right and you'll never go wrong.
Ron Kaufman
#59. How is it that I can want him so badly when he's only been gone from me for a minute?
Amie Kaufman
#60. More rain. If there's any more ran than this, I think, we'll need gills. We could swim up to the sky and leave this place with no need to wait for a rescue ship.
Amie Kaufman
#61. I like titles that are a little difficult, because it's kind of counterintuitive.
Charlie Kaufman
#62. Promise me that no matter what you hear, you won't go off on your own to investigate. I want your word. There's a command in his voice, soft as it is.
Amie Kaufman
#63. Whereas European films have traditionally been able to go into adult relationships. I think there's a huge audience in America for those kinds of films.
Philip Kaufman
#64. Love is the ultimate giving, an expression of one's best self.
Bel Kaufman
#65. There's no way to describe what I do. It's just me.
Andy Kaufman
#66. That's a little homage in a way to that and also to create that sort of creepy atmosphere that Hitchcock did. Vertigo was one of his great movies that was shot right here in The City and it's about a woman and the psychological twists and so forth.
Philip Kaufman
#67. The biggest thing that I came across, right off the bat, was that you can't shoot this like a regular movie with multiple takes. You have to, because it's such a protracted process, break it down to the frame and pretty much get one shot.
Charlie Kaufman
#68. There's theater in life, obviously, and there's life in theater.
Charlie Kaufman
#69. Part of being alive is having life change us. The people around us, the events we live through, all of them shape us. And that's what I think you're afraid of. Maybe not of dying. But of this you, the you you've become, ceasing to exist.
Amie Kaufman
#70. There are things that aren't represented in movies that are a big part of everyone's life. This is a movie about health and about the body.
Charlie Kaufman
#71. I spend a lot of time in preproduction working with authors, and a lot of time in postproduction.: editing, music, all that sort of stuff. Casting. On the set there's not a lot for me to do.
Charlie Kaufman
#72. I am frequently underestimated. I think it's because I'm short.
Amie Kaufman
#73. One person's mess is merely another person's filing system.
Margo Kaufman
#74. And that's it; that's why I want to teach; that's the one and only compensation: to make a permanent difference in the life of a child.
Bel Kaufman
#76. Lilac won't talk to me again. There's a tremor. Lilac won't kiss me again. I won't hear her laugh. My lungs constrict. Why am I doing this to myself ?
Amie Kaufman
#77. Either he trusts me, or he's just that foolish. Probably both. He'd certainly have to be foolish to trust me.
Amie Kaufman
#78. The heart has its reasons; it's the mind that's suspect.
Bel Kaufman
#79. If you ever wanted to take a run at it, I'd say now's your time. There's hardly any competition, unless you count me. Though I am of course very handsome, even dead.
Amie Kaufman
#80. It occurred to me that every work of art is a synecdoche, there's no way around it. Every creative work that someone does can only represent an aspect of the whole of something. I can't think of an exception to that.
Charlie Kaufman
#81. I know a thousand different smiles, each with its own nuanced shade of meaning, but I don't know how to reach the few feet away to touch this person next to me. I don't know how to talk to him. Not when it's real.
Amie Kaufman
#83. Every day of your life, you have information that enters your head, and that information informs your understanding of things, or shifts it, or changes it, or deepens it, or confuses you. Every day, every moment of every day - it's like this thing that happens.
Charlie Kaufman
#84. When I'm writing, I'm trying to immerse myself in the chaos of an emotional experience, rather than separate myself from it and look back at it from a distance with clarity and tell it as a story. Because that's how life is lived, you know?
Charlie Kaufman
#85. I reach for her hand and wind my fingers through hers, turning them so the rain patters down onto her palm. I trace a circle there with my thumb, smoothing the water in her skin. I want to show her there's nothing to be afraid of.
Amie Kaufman
#86. It's not that he's choosing me, a girl he met less than a month ago
he's choosing a world in which no one has to die.
Amie Kaufman
#87. That was part of the whole original concept. We were thinking, it's off-season, let's do a really fun, local-oriented event, raise money for good causes and bring some music to the valley.
Andy Kaufman
#88. The truth. Nobody's coming for us. The place we're running to probably isn't safe. And there is nobody I can trust in this equation except Ezra and Byron.
Amie Kaufman
#89. There's this inherent screenplay structure that everyone seems to be stuck on, this three-act thing. It doesn't really interest me. To me, it's kind of like saying, 'Well, when you do a painting, you always need to have sky here, the person here and the ground here.' Well, you don't.
Charlie Kaufman
#91. I want to try it to see what it's like and see what my stuff looks like when I take it from inception to completion.
Charlie Kaufman
#92. The comparison isn't with others; it's with your former and future selves.
Scott Barry Kaufman
#93. If a teacher wants to know something why doesn't she look it up herself instead of making we students do it? We benefit ourselves more by listening to her, after all she's the teacher!
Bel Kaufman
#94. Now it looks no different from a patch of wildflowers growing in the forest. You could walk right by it, and never know it was there. Except that I do. It's my landmark, now. I'll always know how far I am from this spot. From her.
Amie Kaufman
#95. Substitute the word gay for straight and she's the exact same pain in the neck kid sister she was before she told us.
Amy Kaufman Burk
#96. There's a point I can get to where I start writing character and then through the dialogue, after all of this preparation, the thing starts to feel like it's a character developing through the dialogue. A lot of character traits do come from writing dialogue, but I have to be ready to do it.
Charlie Kaufman
#97. They are always very lax about putting restrictions on violence for children's movies, which I think is much more harrowing than sexuality for children.
Philip Kaufman
#98. I was raised with 'Laurel and Hardy' and 'I Love Lucy' and Jerry Lewis, and I just loved it. And I had a friend in high school and we would just laugh all day and put on skits. You know, it's the Andy Kaufman thing or the Marty Short thing where you're performing in your bedroom for yourself.
Steve Martin
#99. I once complained to my father that I didn't seem to be able to do things the same way other people did. Dad's advice? 'Margo, don't be a sheep.People hate sheep. They eat sheep.'
Margo Kaufman
#100. Words signify man's refusal to accept the world as it is.
Herbert Kaufman
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