Director Quotes

I owe Bankhead a gift; she made a director out of me.

I think I have more of a director's brain than an actor's brain, in a way.

Since stepping down as laboratory director in 1999, I have devoted an increasing fraction of my time to international issues. I am involved with energy, environment, and sustainability issues, particularly as they involve new energy sources free of greenhouse gases.

Time management is a big part of the director's job.

I love the first two X-Men movies because I thought that Bryan Singer did such a great job. He elevated that whole genre. He's a very talented director.

I have worked with another first-time director who was not that open, and it was probably one of the worst experiences I ever had, so my antennas are really out.

I don't feel the need to direct. I tried to get other people to direct Dances, but they wouldn't do it. They all thought it was too long. One director wanted to cut the Civil War sequence. Another thought the white woman was very cliched.

The director took my face in his hands and asked me to show him my teeth, as with a horse. This happened on a Wednesday, and by the following Monday I was shooting.

Actors are accustomed to doing exactly what the director or writer requests us to do, and rarely get involved in that part of the process.

It's natural for any actor that segues into directing to be an actor's director. You know how to relate to the actors.

So when I got the chance to do my first talk show, 50 years ago last month, I never had any writers. There was no budget - it was just me and the camera and my friend who was the director. I talked about what I'd done that week.

When I grow up, I still want to be a director.

After all, at end of the day, when you're breathing your last, it's not your producer, director, or cast mates by your bedside; it's your children. Keep that in mind.

I'm not aware that I was consciously influenced by any director, though these things often happen unnoticed, submerged in the unconscious.

I always claim that the writer has done 90 percent of the director's work.

Film is the manipulative medium par excellence. When you think back on the history of film and the 20th century, you see the propaganda that's been made. So there are moral demands on the director to treat the spectators as seriously as he or she takes himself and not to see them merely as victims that can be manipulated to whatever ends they have.

You have a right to your opinion about the work that you're doing. An artist is as equally important as the director. If you believe that, you can work in any circumstances.

How people are around a director, it really does affect everything, every detail of the life of the movie.

My father worked for governments all his life as an engineer and public works director.

I don't know what I'm qualified to do, film-wise... So it's really down to a director or a casting director to find something that they think I could do.

I'm not one of these directors, so far, that wants to have a whole separate director's cut of these things. So far they've turned out to be kind of the length that they wanted to be.

Now, I have big-money offers on three movies, and I have director approval. That's kind of scary,' he says. 'No directors have been attached. That's a lot of pressure on me.

Alexander Gonzalez Inarritu is a great director. He's the one I first worked with. He's amazing.

I still can't quite believe it. Although there was something about the fact that it was a first-time writer, a first-time producer, and a first-time director all at the same time.

David Mamet was great to work with. He was everything that I thought he would be as a director. He's incredibly articulate, an easy collaborator. Extraordinarily knowledgeable about film and writing.

When I feel like being a director, I write a novel.

In Hollywood there's no real material. They would send me stuff, but I hadn't even seen the director. If I don't see the director's eyes, I'm not going. I'm not even going to pack my bags.

But at the same time, never having final cut before, I really learned an interesting thing for any studio executive who is reading this: that if a director has final cut, it's actually easier and more interesting to listen to notes.

I think that's the key to being a director: to be able to get the shot and move on quickly.

I had great luck with Tim McGraw twice in 'Friday Night Lights' and 'The Kingdom.' I love finding off-beat casting and finding someone you know in one way and you reinvent them in another way. I like doing that as a director.