A Quote by David Mamet

Forget narrative, backstory, characterisation, exposition, all of that. Just make the audience want to know what happens next.

David Mamet

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Audience Exposition Forget Happens Just Know Make Narrative Next Want

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David Mamet
American - Dramatist
Born: November 30, 1947

Consider: for all the gobbledegook [film studio] executives spout about backstory, all that we, the audience, want to know is what happens next. That's the only thing that's going on. . . . Character is nothing other than action, and character-driven means The plot stinks, and you'd better hope the star is popular enough to open the movie in spite of it.

David Mamet

One of the tricks is to have the exposition conveyed in a scene of conflict, so that a character is forced to say things you want the audience to know - as, for example, if he is defending himself against somebody's attack, his words of defense seem Justified even though his words are actually expository words. Something appears to be happening, so the audience believes it is witnessing a scene (which it is), not listening to expository speeches. Humor is another way of getting exposition across.

Ernest Lehman

I think people forget how radical the narrative of 'Slacker' is. There's no story, you know? We could go from one character to the next to the next and never return.

Richard Linklater

You hear it said time and time again by successful directors: You have to make a movie for yourself. Don't make it for anyone else. My style of filmmaking happens to be give the audience what they know they don't want, but they want. Ultimately I have to write and direct in a way that let's just say, you don't want to regret making a choice.

Jordan Peele

Considerations of plot do a great deal of heavy lifting when it comes to long-form narrative - readers will overlook the most ham-fisted prose if only a writer can make them long to know what happens next.

Lynn Coady

It's like, in movies where you talk to the audience 90 percent of the time, it's - you kind of want to stay away from that stuff. But, you know - but to write exposition brilliantly is hard.

Richard Jenkins

What happens when we get back? I don't know. I guess we try and forget. I don't want to forget.

Suzanne Collins

I believe the most important thing you can do in any kind of novel is to make your reader want to go on with it and want to know what happens next.

Ruth Rendell

I am a filmmaker. My job is to make films. When something excites you - a story or characterisation - you immediately forget about everything else. You only think how to make a movie out of it. The economics come only later. You shouldn't let money dictate the kind of films you should make.

S. S. Rajamouli

When you're a regular on a TV show, they give you more of a backstory, so with these recurring gigs, you have to make up your own backstory.

Alan Dale

Many activists don't want to hear about some grand narrative, one that could unify all of our struggles. So the major issue that needs to be addressed is how to get people to see that there is indeed a grand narrative which just happens to be true.

Michael Yates

I love watching scary movies because you always wonder what happens next, and that's what's going to happen on 'The Haunting Hour:' you're always going to want to know what happens next.

Dakota Goyo

The balance when you're catching people up, and the craft of what we do as actors, is to try to make sure that the exposition sounds like thought and dialogue, and a plan or a problem or something that is motivationally induced, rather than just telling the audience information.

Jack Coleman

I will say there is only one caveat as far as 'Logan' goes: I got to the end and went, 'OK, what happens next?' To me, as an audience member, damn. If you can get to the end of the third act of a trilogy and your reaction is 'what the hell happens next,' someone did their job incredibly.

Chris Claremont

Forget the audience, make what you want to see

Sofia Coppola

As a filmmaker, it's not my intent to trigger or shape national discourse. My task is to make as powerful and understandable a film as I can. What happens next is what happens next.

Peter Landesman

A Quote by David Mamet

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