I didn’t write ‘Snow White’ for any class, but I got bitten by the screenwriting bug and wrote a couple of scripts in my spare time instead of going to keg parties or something.
You see a lot of good ideas or well-written scripts that are bad ideas.
Television’s so quick, and there’s so many other fun elements to it, but you don’t get such good scripts and the time to really make much more three dimensional characters.
With the performances, I have been very fortunate to pick things and to find scripts that I really love. I always try to do something that I haven’t done before.
I get a script and it’s really interesting with scripts, because you never really know. It’s paper and it could be great or awful. Even scripts that are good could end up not working.
I know what it is like to fear violence. I understand the adrenalin rush that comes before violent confrontations. I write my scripts from an emotional point of view and direct so the audience can experience this adrenalin rush.
I was at the National Film School and was a cinematographer there. I got quite a lot of experience on documentary film-making and with directors who were interesting – maybe they weren’t using scripts or were using non-actors.
Luckily for me, I get a lot of acting-oriented scripts.
I read a lot of scripts, and there’s a lot of good writing and a lot of OK writing and a lot of crappy writing. And even with the really good writing, it doesn’t necessarily speak to me.
The beats are like scripts, and the raps are my monologue.
I write all my scripts with Salman in mind. He understands me perfectly on the sets.
I have my own set of friends with whom I discuss better story ideas, views and scripts. So I channelize my time in a productive way.
I love all types of music. Jazz, classical, blues, rock, hip-hop. I often write scripts to instrumentals like a hip-hop artist. Music inspires me to write. It’s either music playing or completely silent. Sometimes distant sound fuels you. In New York there’s always a buzzing beneath you.
Anytime I’m given scripts where I’m sort of the fantasy girl, it’s hard for me because that’s not real and I don’t think it’s a great thing to put out there consistently.
I’m still reading some scripts and I model as well, so I’m still doing that. But I don’t want to do like just anything so we’re being really selective about the stuff I’ll do.
Our characters were antiseptic but we weren’t. And if you remember what we did on BATMAN, as the scripts were written very funny, we played them very straight.
I’m reading scripts, desperately wanting to work. I’ve set a couple of things up for next year.
Dad has been my guiding force. Whenever I am confused about choosing a script, I discuss it with him. However, I have said ‘no’ to scripts he agreed to, while he has said ‘yes,’ too, for scripts I have turned down. We have this mutual understanding that works between us.
I don’t get that many scripts. Back in Australia, I’ve pretty much done my own shows and really no work outside of that. It’s only now that I’m starting to read some Hollywood film scripts, and I’ve read some really great ones.
With my characters, I prefer to not say too much, and in fact, I tend to cut down some of the lines in most scripts I get.
Whenever I get any of the ‘Game of Thrones’ scripts, it’s always like, ‘oh my God, how am I going to do this?’ It’s a sort of performance anxiety about being able to do a good job.
I’m listening to scripts and would like to play characters that’d strike a chord with the masses.
It’s unusual when you get scripts not wanting to change things – I’m one of those actors who writers must hate as I’m always wanting to rewrite or swap bits about.
I was reading through endless junk scripts that were being sent my way. Typically the roles were to play his wife or his girlfriend – leading roles for women were few and far between.
I read a lot of bad scripts and weird television shows. I don’t know. There’s a lot of work out there I was reading at 14 years old and noticing this lack of thought. And then, reading ‘Afterschool,’ that’s full of thought. It was bursting with ideas.
I do a lot of improvising when I’m writing, and I work very hard on the scripts… they are written very much in an actor-friendly way.
I hadn’t done comedy before ‘Fresh Meat’ – I hadn’t really been seen that way, and then ‘Fresh Meat’ came out, and suddenly a lot more comedy scripts were coming my way, which was really great.
The one good thing is that I get a lot more good scripts coming through my letterbox. ‘Vera Drake’ raised my profile in one way, and then ‘Harry Potter’ in another.
I have always wanted to be more interested in scripts.
A. L. Vijay asked if I could dance, and I just said yes. I didn’t tell him the only dancing I had done was on nights out in Liverpool. He said he would arrange workshops and help me with the scripts and the language. He liked the fact that I was English but had an Indian look.
I am a little old fashioned, and I love to have my scripts printed out. There is something magical about feeling the paper, making notes and page marks.
I have a lot of incomplete short films and incomplete scripts out there.
I was kind of burned out, a little jaded, and just sort of disillusioned by all the ‘Mighty Duck’ movies and everything just being about making money and not really caring about scripts anymore.
I was a novelist first. But in the mid-’80s, I did work in television for ten years. And yes, that was frequently the reaction to my scripts. People would say, ‘You know, George, this is great. We love it, a terrific script, but it would cost five times our budget to shoot this.’
Most scripts that get written in Hollywood don’t go anywhere.
People are calling a lot, sending scripts my way. Yes, it’s wonderful because, let’s face it, there aren’t many wonderful scripts for women over the age of 10.
A lot of actors look at scripts and think, ‘How will this stretch me as an actor?’ But I always thought, ‘Do I want to turn the page? Is this going to make people laugh?’
At this point, I’m happy to be part of something special. As an actor I liked to choose scripts that I’m passionate about.
It’s overwhelming and humbling to be the recipient of a National Award, and I only hope to find scripts now that will solidify that honor.
When I read a script, I always – the first question I ask myself is, ‘Is there something that I could bring to it that maybe the next guy wouldn’t?’ Because I’ve read a lot of very good scripts and thought there are people who could do this better than I.
I have tried to make decisions to work with great directors, with good scripts, and that makes the pickings real slim.
I don’t speculate too much about the future. That’s the thing about this job – it’s so fickle. You take the jobs, you read the scripts and, if something interests you and you like the people who are working on it, you go for it.
The greatest gift that an actor can have is good scripts because then you’re relieved of the responsibility of trying to elevate the material.
I often get sent scripts about little men in big situations. There’s a comic element to it, which is forces stacked against this little guy, and how is he going to defeat them?
The trouble is, being an actor, you’re always being sent scripts, so you’ve always got something to read. You’ve always got about three scripts to read, that you have to read, all the time. So finding a book or getting into a book series is hard, especially for me.
I’ve got one outlet now – music – and it’s great to be able to sign someone that excites me. I’d like to also be able to do that with the scripts I get or books or TV shows… I’m not going to limit myself.
I don’t use composers. I research music the way I research the photographs or the facts in my scripts.
I would say 80% of the scripts I get are dramas and not comedies or romantic comedies, which is funny because that’s what I do every week.
I started in the era when Hollywood reveled in being the most cost-inefficient industry on the planet. They used to commission a hundred scripts for every one they made.
When I was in New York, a lot of my friends were studying filmmaking and would bring their scripts to me, as I was a good script doctor. I would read their scripts and make corrections to them for $20 per script and was fascinated by films.
When people slave over those scripts and pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for them, they don’t usually want you to add farts.
Writers are first directors. When directing our own scripts, we would have a better vision and clarity than directing the stories penned by others. I personally think that a writer’s job is tough than a director’s.
I look at scripts really for whether they can be moving or penetrate some kind of truth. You are constantly chasing that feeling as an actor when every part of a production comes together.
I never had a boundary as an actor and I am open to interesting scripts.
I have scripts that I’ve only shown to animals… and they passed on them.
Good scripts that are offered to me are few and far between, so I pick the best that I get.
There’s no point in me meeting with a bunch of producers or studios, because I’ll write my own scripts in my own time.
