A Quote by Steven C. Harper
In the beginning this was just an idea. Then it was a short story. Then it was a script. Each step was pretty exciting to see people come on board to support the project. It's gratifying to know that more people are seeing my work in this form than my work as a playwright. And it's been fun to hear people's response to seeing it. I've been having some deep conversations with strangers and friends about how much it has made them think about slavery and its impact today.
Quote Topics
About
Been
Beginning
Board
Come
Conversations
Deep
Each
Exciting
Form
Friends
Fun
Gratifying
Having
Hear
Hear People
How
How Much
Idea
Impact
In The Beginning
Just
Know
Made
More
More People
Much
People
Playwright
Pretty
Project
Response
Script
See
Seeing
Short
Short Story
Slavery
Some
Step
Story
Strangers
Strangers And Friends
Support
Than
Them
Then
Think
Today
Work
Quote Author
Related Quotes
I know I am a human being. I can give myself to one year for a project. That is why I say I'm primitive in the way I work, especially compared to most artists. I came to New York in 1974, knowing that it is the art center of the world. But I didn't go to find people for my work. I do the work, and the people come to me, and I learn from them. That has always been my approach - to do the job first and then to respond to it after I finish and learn what people think about it. That's how I develop, and I'm more of an outsider in that way.
There's no doubt about it: fun people are fun. But I finally learned that there is something more important, in the people you know, than whether they are fun. Thinking about those friends who had given me so much pleasure but who had also caused me so much pain, thinking about that bright, cruel world to which they'd introduced me, I saw that there's a better way to value people. Not as fun or not fun, or stylish or not stylish, but as warm or cold, generous or selfish. People who think about others and people who don't. People who know how to listen, and people who only know how to talk.
I love when you get to work with people who care about the project as much as you do because then, you're altogether in. I feel like I've been lucky so far to have the chance to work with people who work that way.
My work isn't about form. It's about seeing. I'm excited about seeing things, and I'm interested in the way I think other people see things.
I do get stressed at times, but I love what I do as an actor. This is the part that I don't like. I don't actually like talking about - I wish I could just go and get on with my job, because I love getting a script, breaking it down, working with other people, bonding with other people, fighting with other people, and out of those arguments, creating something that nobody expected and seeing it all come together. Telling a story, having an impact on people's lives, moving them and making them laugh.
It's just about having faith in what I wrote and following through on the plan and making sure I get the pieces the way that I need them. It's just about executing properly in production and then in post, you know, it's working [with] and trusting my editor, and then also playing the film for people and seeing how they react.
The public interest always surprises me. I come to work in these rooms with no windows. At night I go home. I just live my life. I guess I just don't think much about whether people are going to watch. Most of my friends don't know much about what I do, and we don't talk about it. I have a different life away from work. Which is fine, because my work can get pretty intense.
There are some really great books that have been written about slavery, but I don't think that the discourse about it in society has been very accurate or healthy. I don't think we've come up with ways to tell it that don't insult people or hit them in the wrong way. Part of the problem is that most people don't really understand what slavery was anyway. Most white people didn't own slaves. Slavery was a way of life, just like driving cars is a way of life now. It doesn't mean that it was right.
I've gotten to work with people like Kristin Chenoweth and Chita Rivera... Seeing their process is so interesting. Seeing that these people aren't immortal - that they go through the same motions as we do and ask for feedback and break down scenes... They have to work, too, and that's really exciting to see.
There's something fascinating about seeing something you don't like at first but directly know you will love—in time. People are that way, all through life. You come against a personality, and it questions yours. You shy away but know there are gratifying secrets there, and the half-open door is often more exciting than the wide.
What you hear in focus groups and conversations, people will give you 20 minutes of rage about how the borders are out of control. But then you start saying, practically, what are we going to do about it? What are we going to do about the 11 million here? What are we going to do to get some workers we need for the farms? Then people start having a normal conversation.
There is nothing interesting about just seeing me doing the show then seeing the fans and how much people love me.
I have to slow down for some people. In Louisiana, people didn't have a clue what I was talking about. I remember seeing people glaze over. Seeing the moment where they've just completely lost all... They just wait for me to stop talking and then say, 'Yeah.'
I make spaces that apprehend light for our perception, and in some ways gather it, or seem to hold it...my work is more about your seeing than it is about my seeing, although it is a product of my seeing.
I'm not totally blind to the fact that I like people to see my work, but if it's not something I would enjoy seeing in a magazine, then I think I shouldn't be making it. I think that I don't represent only myself, I represent more people; I mean, if I like it, then I think more people will like it because I think I'm quite a normal guy.
You know what has made me the happiest I've ever been? Seeing my son and daughter graduate from college. More than wanting them to be educated, I wanted them to be nice people. To see that they have become both is just a wonderful thing.
