Top 100 Quotes About Screenwriter
#1. Simply by eliminating description, the screenwriter can work his way through the entire plot in a single morning, leaving the afternoon free for screenwriter leisure activities such as drugs.
Dave Barry
#2. I've been a screenwriter for twenty-five years. Every one of my books have been optioned for movies and I have written a few of those screenplays.
Alice Hoffman
#3. Being a screenwriter in Hollywood is like being a eunuch at an orgy. Worse, actually, at least the eunuch is allowed to watch.
Albert Brooks
#4. Whenever I work on a film, I have three rules. Only three and I tell them to every screenwriter. I say let's retain the spirit and the intent of the overall story. Let's make it the best film that we possibly can.
Nicholas Sparks
#5. Bill Condon, I must say, may have been one of the best professional experiences of my life, collaborating with him. He, himself, is an Academy Award winning screenwriter. He is a storyteller first and foremost, so we speak the same language. We approach things always from the story.
Melissa Rosenberg
#6. Ever since I was young, 14 or 15, I wondered if you could write a book that combined the visceral thrill of watching a movie with the total immersion you feel when you're inside a good book. And I had some success as a screenwriter before I began writing books.
Rick Yancey
#7. I want a career writing these novels that I can be proud of. And then I want one as a screenwriter.
Stephan Pastis
#8. Screenwriter Flacco nicely evokes the aftermath of San Francisco's 1906 earthquake in his fiction debut, a novel of suspense.
William Bernhardt
#9. Every adaptation requires that the screenwriter make difficult choices - and in particular, difficult cuts.
David Benioff
#10. I was just starting out, trying to become a screenwriter, and I became the Austin slam champion three times. For a nerdy, kind of a socially awkward guy, that did wonders for my self esteem.
Ernest Cline
#11. I've certainly seen stats that if you have a woman director or a woman screenwriter, the number of female characters goes way up.
Emma Donoghue
#12. I guess like any writer or screenwriter I'm alone in my own world so much of the time that I'm often trying to force myself out of my world. Into more risk. A less controlled kind of inspiration. I'm so keenly aware of how easy it's getting to not leave the house, with Amazon, especially.
Miranda July
#13. Novelist by day; screenwriter by night.
A.D. Posey
#14. I always loved movies, but I never thought I would presume to be a screenwriter and definitely not a director.
Cameron Crowe
#15. I was a painter, then a novelist, then a journalist, then a screenwriter, and now I'm a director, and it feels all part of the same continuum. One led to the other, and it just feels like the natural confluence of all the ways of storytelling that I've been doing for almost 30 years.
Peter Landesman
#16. You are the executive director and screenwriter of your life.
Eric Thomas
#17. To have someone like Clint Eastwood come along and shoot your first draft as written is just any screenwriter's dream. And Clint is very straightforward. If it's good enough to get his attention, it's good enough to produce.
J. Michael Straczynski
#18. The filmmaking process is a team effort. A screenwriter cannot possibly do exactly what he wants as if he was writing a novel.
Leigh Brackett
#19. If you want to be a great director, be a great screenwriter.
Akira Kurosawa
#20. It's really hard as a screenwriter, you feel like you have a vision and then you turn it over to a director and you have to let it go.
Lorene Scafaria
#21. My daughter has seen the transition from struggling screenwriter to successful picture book author, and she's enjoyed it very much because she's a wonderful little kid. And she's always believed in her daddy.
Drew Daywalt
#22. A screenwriter is much like being a fire hydrant with a bunch of dogs lined up around it.
Frank Miller
#23. I think that scripts should be published, but they are published, really, because when you're a screenwriter, your stuff ends up in samizdat form on thousands and thousands of desks and shelves across the industry.
William Monahan
#24. A great trick that I learned having worked as a screenwriter for many years, the way screenwriters work, is they break the project down into three-act structure: Act 1, Act 2, Act 3. I think that is a great way to break down any project, whether it's a new business or anything at all.
Steven Pressfield
#25. Nothing, I find, has prepared me for the sight of my own characters walking about. A playwright or screenwriter must expect it; a novelist doesn't and naturally concludes that she has gone mad.
Susanna Clarke
#26. I probably could be a world-class screenwriter by now if I had spent the kind of work I devote on Comedy Death-Ray to that. But I do okay, in that regard. I mean, my stuff gets bought, so it's all right.
Scott Aukerman
#27. I was a novelist before I was a TV screenwriter. Actually, as a kid, I think I'd always wanted to be a writer, but never thought that I would be one.
Ben Richards
#28. My brother is a screenwriter. He likes to say, 'I like to take on a genre when it's dying, because then people are ready for you to shake it up a little bit.'
Mark Waters
#29. But here's the thing: what you do as a screenwriter is you sell your copyright. As a novelist, as a poet, as a playwright, you maintain your copyright.
Beth Henley
#30. With a novel, you're the director and the screenwriter and everything else, except that you have to write it knowing it will all be performed inside the head of the reader. So it's a difficult and lonely task.
Jason Henderson
#31. When I was growing up in the south Indian city of Madras, there were only two political parties that mattered; one was run by a former matinee idol, and the other was run by his former screenwriter.
Aravind Adiga
#32. You get spoiled as a novelist because you get to be the director and the editor, and you play all the parts, but as a screenwriter, you are a bit down the ladder.
Jo Nesbo
#33. My mom was a screenwriter. I saw a lot of people who didn't seem very fulfilled creatively or otherwise by their roles in the motion picture industry.
Matthew Specktor
#34. I started writing morning pages just to keep my hand in, you know, just because I was a writer and I didn't know what else to do but write. And then one day as I was writing, a character came sort of strolling in and I realized, Oh my God, I don't have to be just a screenwriter. I can write novels.
Julia Cameron
#35. When I was really young I didn't know that there was such a thing as a screenwriter. I wrote stories.
John Sayles
#36. As a screenwriter I'm often writing in genres where there have been thousands of movies; whereas when I direct movies they tend to be in between genres. They tend to have a little bit of a genre to them, but they're really about the people, and they're people we haven't met before.
John Sayles
#37. When you're a screenwriter, it's like being a mechanic. You open the hood of the story, the director is the driver, and he says, "What do you think? It's a little tough."
Thomas Bidegain
#38. What I want is to be the highest grossing screenwriter, or to have some other woman be the highest grossing screenwriter, instead of being number nine on the list. That's my goal.
Melissa Rosenberg
#39. As a screenwriter, you have to let go, and you have to hand your baby over and let it go off into the world, which is entirely appropriate.
Philippa Boyens
#40. Over the years, I've realized that I have as much in common with the performance artist, the standup comedian, the screenwriter, as I do with the theologian. I'm in an odd world where I make things and share them with people.
Rob Bell
#41. A lot of writers want everything put on screen, but it doesn't work like that. The screenwriter brings her own imaginative interpretation, just as the director and actors do.
Susan Hill
#42. I look at myself more as a storyteller than a screenwriter, as pretentious as that may sound, but that's what really attracts me to TED Talks. For me, the really effective ones are being presented by expert storytellers.
Damon Lindelof
#43. Silence of the Lambs screenwriter Ted Tally put the art of writing dialogue succinctly: 'What's important is not the emotion they're playing but the emotion they're trying to conceal.
John Yorke
#44. What I do have to get across is the truth of the moment within the given scene. It's my job, as a director and screenwriter, to create the environment in which all those moments will come together eventually.
James Gray
#45. He had a goatee that was maybe growing into something that was more than a goatee, which made him look like an angry barista at an indie coffee shop whose dreams of becoming a successful screenwriter were dwindling by the hour.
Lev Grossman
#46. It's funny because when I was growing up, I was really into science fiction and fantasy as a kid. And, when I first became a screenwriter, I ended up really just doing historical drama and non-fiction based stuff, like Band of Brothers and stuff that didn't get made, but was also non-fiction.
John Orloff
#47. I make my living now as a screenwriter! Which I'm surprised and horrified to find myself saying, but I don't think I can support myself as a playwright at this point. I don't think anybody does.
Tony Kushner
#48. I think part of being a good screenwriter is being as concise as possible.
Eric Roth
#49. Being a screenwriter is not enough for a full creative life.
William Goldman
#50. If a novelist has created vivid characters, interesting relationships, settings the reader can easily imagine, and intriguing stories, a screenwriter has loads to work with. The challenge comes with deciding what to cut and what to keep.
Seth Grahame-Smith
#51. My father was a screenwriter, and I kind of grew up in that world.
Maria Semple
#52. The absolute base-level thing that you do as a new screenwriter is send out query letters. Literally, you just say, 'Hi, Mr. So-and-So,' and you give them a one-sentence description of one of your scripts. You send it out to a list of people you found on the Internet.
Evan Daugherty
#53. If you keep thinking about putting on a conference or being a Hollywood screenwriter, and you find the idea terrifies but intrigues you, it's probably a worthy endeavor for you. You grow (and thrive!) by doing what excites you and what scares you everyday, not by trying to find your passion.
Derek Sivers
#54. What you do is get the right director and the right screenwriter and the right cast. It's a fantastic job.
Robbie Coltrane
#55. Wanting to be a screenwriter is like wanting to be a co-pilot.
Marshall Brickman
#56. You get to Hollywood and you are in the land of big money where they don't like to see only one screenwriter's name. It's much better if you've got four or five.
Nigel Kneale
#57. When a novelist or screenwriter is looking for a subject, the element he's seeking is conflict. Conflict makes drama. Conflict produces great characters and memorable scenes. So war is a natural topic.
Steven Pressfield
#58. When I was a screenwriter, I was doing it for mercenary reasons.
James Frey
#59. I became a playwright and screenwriter. Italian-Americans were my particular specialty. I liked the way they talked. There was something free in it.
John Patrick Shanley
#60. My father was a screenwriter, but he was also a novelist.
Sadie Jones
#61. I consider my job as a screenwriter to pack a script with possibilities and ideas - to create a feast for the filmmaker to pick from.
Jonathan Nolan
#62. I guess you could say I'm a model slash hotelier slash actor slash screenwriter.
Vikram Chatwal
#63. Being a good television screenwriter requires an understanding of the way film accelerates the communication of words.
Steven Bochco
#64. The great thing, as a screenwriter, is that you are always proud of what ends up on the screen, you are able to create something in isolation and you have a lot of freedom.
Jamie Linden
#65. As a screenwriter, there's so many layers you have to go through in order to tell your story. You have to write the script, get money for the script, shoot it, find distributors, make it into film festivals, all of that just to get to your audience.
Morley
#66. Truth like a blanket that always leaves your feet cold screenwriter of Dead Poets' Society.
Tom Schulman
#67. No one should feel sorry for a successful screenwriter.
Tony Gilroy
#68. One of the things I love about my job as a playwright or as a screenwriter is that I get to do a lot of research and a lot of thinking and taking a lot of notes before I turn it in.
Tony Kushner
#69. Fiction and screenwriting blend for me. I feel like being a TV writer/screenwriter has definitely made my fiction writing better, although I have less time to do it.
Nick Antosca
#70. Okay, you got me. The screenwriter is a vampire. Now go to your own desk and call Mimi so she can call me and I can get my day started
Tere Michaels
#71. We always for better or worse try to put on paper what's going up on screen - whether we're directing it or not. It's really just an extension of that habit which is trying to tell the reader what the movie will look like. Ultimately that is the job of a screenwriter to a certain extent.
John Francis Daley
#72. Real pirates were better than in movies, more daring and terrifying and cunning than any screenwriter could imagine. They operated during the Golden Age of Piracy, from 1650 to 1720.
Robert Kurson
#73. The thing about being a screenwriter, scriptwriter, scenarist, You get to have multiple personalities and not be charged.
Andrea L'Artiste
#74. Actually having sex with a screenwriter typically led to a blockbuster.
Marshall Thornton
#75. Strange - I'm not much of a film person. I love watching films, but they don't stay with me the way books do. Stranger still, because my husband is a screenwriter!
Dani Shapiro
#76. I like to write, and I would love to be a screenwriter one day and a director.
Dylan Penn
#77. I have a lot of screenwriter friends and many of them have had an experience where they aren't even welcome on set during production.
Diablo Cody
#78. Developing films with directors, developing films with actors, is a poor percentage play for a screenwriter.
Tony Gilroy
#79. I was in New York. Hitchcock was in California. He rang me to make a report on his progress and said, I'm having trouble. I've just sacked my second screenwriter.
Patricia Highsmith
#80. Normally with film, it's normal for the screenwriter to never be seen again after finishing until the premiere.
Jane Goldman
#81. Lucas George (Walton) (b.1944), American film director, producer, and screenwriter. He wrote and directed the science-fiction film Star Wars (1977),
Amazon Dictionary Account
#82. Yeah, well, I wanted to be a screenwriter, and guess what? I am one. That's the other tragedy in life.
Charles D'Ambrosio
#83. The eternal challenge for screenwriter adapters is figuring out how to make something work on screen, when so much of what made it work in the book were the thoughts of the character, and obviously wanting to avoid voiceover.
David Benioff
#84. Part of my learning curve as a novice screenwriter was peeling back the layers and getting to the core of the story. I was really blessed to have two amazing writing mentors who helped me along the way. They always encouraged me to be okay with a simple story.
Aurora Guerrero
#85. I'm an affluent screenwriter and all that - I'm a known screenwriter, but I'm not in the fraternity of the very, very major people. I would say a guy like Ernie Lehman, William Goldman, and a few others are quite a cut above.
Rod Serling
#86. Every screenwriter worthy of the name has already directed his film when he has written his script.
Joseph L. Mankiewicz
#87. I am happy that I'm a better novelist than a screenwriter.
Graeme Simsion
#88. The author and screenwriter William Goldman says that "the key to all story endings is to give the audience what it wants, but not in the way it expects.
Jon Steel
#89. To be a screenwriter is to deal with an ongoing tug of war between breathtaking megalomania and insecurity so deep it takes years of therapy just to be able to say "I'm a writer" out loud.
Blake Snyder
#90. Since signing with Universal, I have been working closely with Gary Ross, the director, producer and screenwriter. We have spent many hours on the phone, and I've been sending him information and items that have been useful to the writing process.
Laura Hillenbrand
#91. You know, I used to not understand fashion, a lot of it, but I completely understood being a playwright or a screenwriter and suddenly having an actor say your words and making them come to life. That I can understand. Finally, I'm starting to understand this.
Reese Witherspoon
#92. Starting in '98 when I was researching 'Traffic,' I got to meet really serious people in Washington, which for a screenwriter was kind of a great gift. And I really valued these guys; I stayed in touch with them, and I find their point-of-view quite interesting.
Stephen Gaghan
#93. 'The Buccaneers' was an Edith Wharton novel, and she never finished it, and a screenwriter adapted it for television.
James Frain
#94. As a screenwriter and a half-Jew, I tend to look at the glass half-empty.
John Francis Daley
#95. Even though I am in this weird position of being a semi-recognizable screenwriter, which isn't that common, at the same time, I'm not an actress. I'm pretty isolated.
Diablo Cody
#96. "Admission" is Paul Weitz's movie. This is Karen Croner - the screenwriter's - movie. To have such a lovely role in such a beautifully written script offered to me, it's like elves made the shoes.
Tina Fey
#97. And I didn't grow up wanting to be a director. I grew up wanting to be a writer, so for me, that was always the goal - to be a novelist, not a screenwriter. And I think, again, if I didn't have the novels, maybe I'd be much more frustrated by not having directed yet.
David Benioff
#98. My work as a screenwriter has influenced my fiction. Writing screenplays forces you to consider many elements regarding story structure and other narrative devices that can be used to enhance the infinitely more complex demands of a novel.
Carlos Ruiz Zafon
#99. You have to determine what you are and send the messages out to people, like, 'Hey, I'm a screenwriter - look at this.' You can't sit around, wondering why people aren't calling and asking about my writing.
Zach Galligan
#100. The thing about movies is if somebody has an idea that works, it's in, and I say that as a screenwriter as well as a director.
William Monahan
