A Quote by David Mamet
A play is basically a long, formalistic polemic. You can write it without the poetry, and if you do, you may have a pretty good play. We know this because we see plays in translation. Not many people speak Norwegian or Danish or whatever guys like Ibsen spoke, or Russian - yet we understand Chekhov and the others.
Related Quotes
Many people do not know that Jesus did not speak Latin or English or Hebrew; he spoke Aramaic. But nobody knows that language. So we're talking about the Bible itself being a translation of a translation of a translation. And, in reality, it has affected people's lives in history.
I go to see plays all the time, and whenever I see Chekhov, I'm amazed at how this Russian play strikes home to me living 100 years later in New York City. I'm drawn to him because of his way with characters and their relationships with each other.
Personally, I am a nationalist, but my race is my nation, and I see all true Europeans as my racial brethren and part of my nation, be them Norwegian, Danish, or Swedish, French, German, or English, Russian, Polish, or Belorussian, or whatever.
For me, personally, I think the serious gamers - the guys who know the levels - play Xbox, and people who are just good at the game play PS3. I play PS3 because I'm not a serious, serious gamer like that. But when I play the Xbox, the standard is so much higher.
I think in this country we're committed to developing plays, and many plays I've seen have been rewritten too much. The scenes are tight, the play ends at the right time, you know exactly what the scene is about, but it seems flat; you can almost see that too many hands have been on the play. The individual voice is gone.
A lot of young girls who came to see me in 'Legally Blonde' have come to see 'Hedda,' and they hadn't heard of the play either, just like I was before I did it! If I can bring a younger generation to see an Ibsen play; that's just brilliant.
I don't think my looks are modern. I always imagined I'd end up doing Chekhov, Ibsen and Shakespeare all my life and never play a contemporary character.
Russian is such a tough and complex language that I am happy enough to understand everything and read most things pretty well, but, without constant practice, my speech is not what I wish it was, and I would sooner write in crayon than write a letter in Russian.
Also for me it was different because I play a lot of villains and in this one I play a dad and I play a good guy, basically. He's the Secretary of the Treasury. I never had a job like that.
Your life is like a play with several acts. Some of the characters who enter have short roles to play, others, much larger. Some are villains and others are good guys. But all of them are necessary; otherwise, they wouldn't be in the play. Embrace them all, and move on to the next act.
When I started in the theater, I'd do plays by Shakespeare or Ibsen or Chekhov, and they all created great women's roles.
Work with good directors. Without them your play is doomed. At the time of my first play, I thought a good director was someone who liked my play. I was rudely awakened from that fantasy when he directed it as if he loathed it. . . . Work with good actors. A good actor hears the way you (and no one else) write. A good actor makes rewrites easy. A good actor tells you things about your play you didn't know.
What I meant by that is, any time you have adversity, now you've got a chance to see all of these guys play every game the rest of the way like it's a playoff game. What you want guys to do when there's adversity is to play harder and play better, and that's when you see what kind of guys you have in your locker room.
Some guys play so straight, and that may be their thing; like, a lot of guys are good playing like that. I can't play like that. I have to flair out. I have to yell. I gotta scream. I gotta talk trash - that's how I get myself going.
The success I had as a player, or the career I had as a player, is often based on the guys you play beside, the guys you play with. Playing on the offensive line, you're only as good as your weakest guy up front. I was blessed to play with a lot of guys for a long time.
If everybody'd agree to quit using money, I'd be happy to play for free every day for awhile. But I don't play benefits or any kind of fund-raisers. I prefer to play at hospitals, for people who otherwise can't see us. But I can't see playing for causes, whatever the cause may be.
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