A Quote by Terry Southern

Writing on a contract for a major studio you get the very best. — © Terry Southern
Writing on a contract for a major studio you get the very best.
I was put under contract. A major studio. I got nominated for an Academy Award. Isn't that ridiculous? I mean, at the age of 18!
If I would characterize my life, I would say that I was a very lucky actor who came into very lucky times, and got to Hollywood, and was put under contract by Warners in the very last days of the studio contract era, and was privileged to go through that time which is gone now.
I hate studios. A studio is a black hole. I never use a studio to work. It's very artificial to go to a studio to get new ideas. You have to get new ideas from life, not from the studio. Then you go to the studio to realize the idea.
I am one day going to be working openly in the motion picture industry. When that day comes, I swear to you that I will never sign a term contract with any major studio
I am one day going to be working openly in the motion picture industry. When that day comes, I swear to you that I will never sign a term contract with any major studio.
I write in the studio, I don't sit around with a piano or a guitar and write songs. I get satisfaction out of that because I can finish the song really quickly. I can use whatever momentum I have. I've got to put it down, develop it, and get it as far [as I can], because the excitement of the moment of when you get that idea - you want to try and hold it and build on it and really gain strength from it. Being in the studio and writing songs like that is really the best way.
This blacklisting is going to collapse because it is rotten, immoral and illegal. I am one day going to be working openly in the motion picture industry. When that day comes, I swear to you that I will never sign a term contract with any major studio. I will, proudly and by preference, do at least one picture a year for King Brothers, and I will try to make it the best picture that I have it in me to do
If you end up spending more time in the studio than you do on the road, that's not a good balance for me. Because I think when you're in the studio, you need to come off the road and go in the studio and that's when you're applying your best. That's when you've got the best attitude, best energy, all that stuff.
The last true punk band to get a major label contract was The Dickies.
I made promises to myself and my family that I'd be in the UFC before my first daughter was born, that didn't happen. I was almost at breaking point a week before I got that contract, I was going to go back to concreting - that weekend I get my major sponsor, which was huge, and I end up getting my UFC contract the weekend after that.
I'm even stunned at some of the majors you can get in college these days. Like you can major in the mating habits of the Australian rabbit bat, major in leisure studies... Okay, get a journalism major. Okay, education major, journalism major. Right. Philosophy major, right. Archeology major. I don't know, whatever it is. Major in ballroom dance, of course. It doesn't replace work. How about a major in film studies? How about a major in black studies? How about a major in women studies? How about a major in home ec? Oops, sorry! No such thing.
I've got my own studio, so I sit in my studio writing and if I get a great take, that's the take.
At a certain point you have to make a decision in your life about where will you best serve, and I decided that I would best serve as a producer as opposed to a studio executive. There are many upsides to being the studio executive, but one of the downsides is that you get removed from the actual process of making the movie.
Wintertime for me is a time when I do a lot of my writing in the studio. It's a time I enjoy. And it's very reflective and a very calming time of the year. Throughout the year I gather a lot of musical inspirations, and this is where I bring them to the studio and see what will evolve musically.
In major studio scripts, the girls are very similar. They're all witty and hot. I'm more of an oddball.
I'd rather the handshake for somebody that I can trust than a contract. Because you can read the bloody contract - perhaps if you made a little bit of a mistake writing it - in a way to suit you.
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