Theatre Quotes
For use in newsletters, season or fundraising brochures or emails, presentations--you name it.
Category | Quote | First | Last | Source |
---|---|---|---|---|
Acting |
A lot of what acting is paying attention. |
Robert | Redford | |
Playwriting |
A novelist may lose his readers for a few pages; a playwright never dares lose his audience for a minute. |
Terence | Rattigan | |
Acting |
Having talent is like having blue eyes. You don't admire a man for the colour of his eyes. I admire a man for what he does with his talent. |
Anthony | Quinn | Sunday Express, 1960 |
General |
It hath evermore been the notorious badge of prostituted Strumpets and the lewdest Harlots, to ramble abroad to Plays, to Playhouses; whither no honest, chaste or sober Girls or Women, but only branded Whores and infamous Adulteresses, did usually resort in ancient times. |
William | Prynne | http://izquotes.com/ |
Shakespeare |
Brush up your Shakespeare |
Cole | Porter | Kiss Me, Kate (musical) |
Acting |
Act well your part; there all the honor lies. |
Alexander | Pope | Essay on Man, Epistle iv, line 193 |
Costumes |
If you do a certain amount of work on your own before consulting with the director then the process starts with the script. I tend to do a certain amount of my own work before I go into a first meeting. It is important to be open minded in your first meeting with a director but I like to be well-prepared for that meeting because sometimes that time with your director can be limited. At the time of that first meeting, I will have read the play several times and from different points of view. I might read the play once to just check how many costume changes there are. I will read it again to make a prop list. I will read it again to analyse where the entrances and exits are and also to imagine where the furniture will be. It's difficult to concentrate on all of these things in one reading so I go through these processes in separate readings. Once you have that under your belt, depending on the period of the production, I guess I start to do visual research based on my response to the text. Depending on where and when I might choose to look at photography of the period or I might choose to look at painting or I might just look at history books and look for thematic influences. That's the start and having done that you team up with your director and see what their response is to those ideas you have and then you start to form a stronger direction. [Christina Poddubiuk, Set and Costume designer] |
Christina | Poddubiuk | http://www.artsalive.ca |
Costumes, Set Design |
I think the best shows are always the ones where the elements come together very well and where the intention is realized. These are the shows in which what you set out do is what you end up with. Through very fortunate circumstances, like the combination of a good director, a good cast, and other people designing, you all manage to end up at the point that you intended when you started out. Nothing is ever perfect and there are always things that you'd perhaps do differently but I think that as long as you get a sense of fulfillment from a show then it is going to be a good experiences. [Christina Poddubiuk, Set and Costume designer] |
Christina | Poddubiuk | http://www.artsalive.ca |
Acting, Directing, Diversity & Inclusion, Playwriting |
5 Tips to Increase Diversity in Theatre: 1. Be proactive and participate in outreach to groups that represent actors of color, like Asian-American Performers Action Coalition or the African-American Artists Alliance, to bring them into the casting process. 2. If you’re a playwright, lyricist, book writer, or a creator, ask yourself if the race of your characters is relevant to the story, and if not, specify that. 3. Do your research on racism and internal bias before beginning the creative process. Understanding the history of these issues within the business will help create an inclusive and positive environment. 4. As an actor, be conscious of the roles you accept and be self-reflective about whether your racial or ethnic background or physical abilities would be appropriate for the part you’re playing. 5. Be careful of engaging in tokenism or promoting harmful or damaging caricatures. Truly color-conscious casting gives members of marginalized groups opportunities to play real, developed characters, not one-dimensional stereotypes. |
Playbill |
Playbill, June 23, 2017 [ https://www.playbill.com/article/5-steps-toward-making-theatre-more-diverse ] |
|
Playwriting |
As a writer you're holding a dog. You let the dog run about. But you finally can pull him back. Finally, I'm in control. But the great excitement is to see what happens if you let the whole thing go. And the dog or the character really runs about, bites everyone in sight, jumps up trees, falls into lakes, gets wet, and you let that happen. That's the excitement of writing plays--to allow the thing to be free but still hold the final leash. |
Harold | Pinter | http://www.curtainup.com/quotepro.html |
Playwriting |
The more acute the experience, the less articulate its expression. |
Harold | Pinter | The Audience Book of Theatre Quotations, by Louis Phillips |
Set Design |
I've always tended to work with the set as another character in the play. |
George | Pinney | http://www.iu.edu/~rcapub/v29n1/sets.shtml |
General |
Although one may fail to find happiness in theatrical life, one never wishes to give it up after having once tasted its fruits. |
Anna | Pavlova | |
Acting |
My playground was the theatre. I'd sit and watch my mother pretend for a living. As a young girl, that's pretty seductive. |
Gwyneth | Paltrow | http://www.worldofquotes.com |
Critics |
Asking a working writer what he thinks about critics is like asking a lamppost what it feels about dogs. |
John | Osborne | Time, 31 October 1977 |
Acting |
Use your weaknesses; aspire to the strength. |
Laurence | Olivier | Friendly Advice by Jon Winokur |
Acting |
I have to act to live. |
Laurence | Olivier | http://theatre.usc.edu/whatistheatre |
Acting |
Acting is an everlasting search for truth. |
Laurence | Olivier | http://www.curtainup.com/quotepro.html |
Acting |
When you're a young man, Macbeth is a character part. When you're older, it's a straight part. |
Laurence | Olivier | Theatre Arts May 58 |
Acting |
What is the main problem of the actor? It is to keep the audience awake, and not let them go to sleep, then wake up and go home feeling they've wasted their money. |
Laurence | Olivier | |
Acting |
Lead the audience by the nose to the thought. |
Laurence | Olivier | Friendly Advice by Jon Winokur |
Acting |
Have a very good reason for everything you do. |
Laurence | Olivier | Friendly Advice by Jon Winokur |
Acting |
I have no intention of uttering my last words on the stage. Room service and a couple of depraved young women will do me quite nicely for an exit. |
Peter | O'Toole | |
Acting |
Acting expresses a part of the self otherwise hidden to the conscious mind. |
Lisa M. | O'Neill | |
General, Playwriting |
Theater is so critical because it has always been able to release people from their isolation... The theater is a communal event, church. The playwright constructs a mass to be performed for a lot of people. She writes a prayer, which is just the longings of one heart. |
Marsha | Norman | |
Fundraising |
You cannot expect people to give to you on an annual basis if they have never heard of your organization or are unaware of what you do in the community and why it is so important. As part of this annual giving plan, your board of directors (with staff help) needs to have a time of brainstorming so you can identify all your “target markets” i.e. those people with whom you need to establish a relationship. |
NonprofitExpert.com | http://www.nonprofitexpert.com/annualgiving.htm | |
Acting |
All the theories that acting is reacting to imaginary circumstances as though they are real, and directing is turning psychology into behavior, those are all stabs at something that can't be taught. All the great actors can't talk about what they do, and they don't want to begin to talk about it. They just do it. |
Mike | Nichols | |
Acting, Directing |
The whole point about laughter is it's like mercury: you can't catch it, you can't catch what motivates it - that's why it's funny. |
Mike | Nichols | |
Acting |
Acting isn't really a creative profession. It's an interpretive one. |
Paul | Newman | http://www.satheatre.com/quotes.htm |
Acting |
The fun for me is knowing what the other person is saying and what my character would be thinking at that time. On the stage you get the chance to do all that, to analyze and build a part, to react, to contribute something no one else can--not the author, not even the director. |
Barry | Nelson | It Happened On Broadway |
Acting, Directing, General |
Opening Night: The night before the play is ready to open. |
George Jean | Nathan | The Audience Book of Theatre Quotations, by Louis Phillips |
General, Playwriting |
Drama - what literature does at night. |
George Jean | Nathan | |
Playwriting |
The Russian dramatist is one who, walking through a cemetery, does not see the flowers on the graves. The American dramatist . . . Does not see the graves under the flowers. |
George Jean | Nathan | The Audience Book of Theatre Quotations, by Louis Phillips |
Lighting |
I think that the first thing that I learned about lighting design was that there are no real rules involved and that as long as I remembered this then my lighting would remain fresh and interesting to me and hopefully to the audience and to the people that I collaborate with. |
Jock | Munro | http://www.artsalive.ca |
Lighting |
Theatre is interesting because it's a very collaborative process. Typically I'm working with a director, a set designer, a costume designer and a sound designer too. That means that there are a number of perspectives that are brought into any particular script. Typically the director has the final say in where we go conceptually with a piece but we all have an opportunity to influence that direction and typically that direction is based on the script. As such, my studies in english and philosophy have enriched my ability to take a look at a text and react to it in my own way so that I can bring to the table what I consider to be an informed perspective. Then we negotiate the project's process and it's always quite enriching. Projects basically come out of a bond of trust that you have created. As I have progressed throughout my career I have gravitated to people who I feel a common bond with; who I seem to be able to communicate with. We establish a trust and then we go about our project. Very often I will work with someone for three or four years and we will have a particularly creative time and then, for whatever reasons, we will go our separate ways and new bonds will be established. It's an extremely communal approach to the arts. [Lighting designer Jock Munro] |
Jock | Munro | http://www.artsalive.ca |
General, Lighting |
I find that kids who take conventional approaches whereby they study in theatre schools and then become assistants to established artists at various reputed institutions like Stratford and the National Arts Centre have a kind of fast-track to the knowledge process. Very often they become very useful to the institutions for their knowledge. At the same time they are often are denied the fundamental experiences that you get when you are actually producing your own theatre and making decisions yourself among your own peers. I think it's really important to place more emphasis on that than on getting a formal training. You can probably successfully, after you've gotten the buzz and you've become intoxicated if you want to enhance your knowledge in certain areas then it's worthwhile to go back to the institutions and find a niche. I found my niche though being a stagehand. You can be an assistant. You can be a production assistant. I think the key is to be around people who really, truly love what they are doing first, although they might not necessarily know what they are doing. [Lighting designer Jock Munro] |
Jock | Munro | http://www.artsalive.ca |
General, Playwriting |
Farce is tragedy played at a thousand revolutions per minute. |
John | Mortimer | |
Acting |
It is a great help for a man to be in love with himself. For an actor, however, it is absolutely essential. |
Robert | Morley | Friendly Advice by Jon Winokur |
General, Musical Theatre |
A flop is often the result of the fact that each of the talents involved, while working on the same project, may in effect have been working on a different show from all the others. If all contributors do not share the same vision of the evening, the end product will not evince the harmony of diverse elements--the seeming inevitability of book, score, and staging--of a good musical. |
Ethan | Mordden | Not Since Carrie |
Acting |
If you achieve success, you will get applause. Enjoy it--but never quite believe it. |
Robert | Montgomery | Friendly Advice by Jon Winokur |