Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
After 'Brothers & Sisters' ended, I was back to the old game as an actor. Doing pilot season, choosing a script and figuring out what I wanted to do.
The director is a Canadian, Jeff Stephenson, and any time I get a script that has any Canadian component, I'm always immediately much more interested.
I don't really look for a script and go, 'I need to do a thriller, so I'm going to do this.' I just read scripts and look for the best possible story.
I've had three novels published, and I was working a little bit in theater in Ireland. I wrote one film script just to see what it would turn out like.
Finally, Colin Farrell showed up on my doorstep, only he wasn't Colin Farrell - he was just this Irish kid who had read the script and wanted to do it.
You see a script, and you say, 'Oh, I can play the heck out of that,' talk to your agent, and he says they don't want to see you. That's heartbreaking.
When I mention that I'm a game designer as well as a writer, someone will nod and say, 'Ah, that's what we like about your script. The videogame feel.'
The main problem was a pacing problem. I had wanted the project to be about 20-30 issues, and I should have written it out as a full script beforehand.
I, of course, wanted to do something with Drew Barrymore. Please. So we were reading scripts back and forth and then we found this script, Fever Pitch.
You can start with a great director and great actors and have a great script - and it still just doesn't work. It's kind of a mystery how that happens.
Even on television, it is all about the script of the show and my character. It has nothing to do with whether I am bagging the lead role or any other.
I definitely script things out. I definitely write things down and try to write jokes. Often, they're terrible. I often write terrible, terrible jokes.
The first thing that attracts me to any script is the writing. If I find myself becoming lost in a good yarn, then I feel certain that others will, too.
I got involved in script development from the beginning. It was nice to see how a film gets made right from the beginning. It was quite hands-on for me.
I'm so touched that complete strangers will send me a script asking me to be in their film. That still amazes me - and sometimes for a lot of money too.
If I feel like it's a well-written script and if it speaks to me, it's something I want to do. I usually rely on my instincts when it comes to a script.
The script is the coloring book that you're given, and your job is to figure out how to color it in. And also when and where to color outside the lines.
You know when you've found a part that you want to play. You know it because the part takes you over. It sits in the script waiting for you to play him.
I do finish reading a script and say, Why are they making it and what are they talking about? I like to try and be responsible in my choices in that way.
When I can see things through the lens of the director, it's like being able to see the whole puzzle - it's not just about my role, but the whole script.
I wrote a script. I actually enjoyed writing it more than acting. It's about the Irish rebellion of 1920, which is a fascinating period and place for me.
That's the thing about the script, is that how these people were affected by their decision, and how it could ultimately kill them, and I mean literally.
I did three or four weeks of work on 'Godzilla;' it wasn't a page-one rewrite or anything like that. The term is 'script doctoring,' is what I did on it.
When an actor comes to me and wants to discuss his character, I say, 'It's in the script.' If he says, 'But what's my motivation?, ' I say, 'Your salary.'
I sold my first script when I was 21 - this kids' adventure movie that never got made. I just bought that one back, actually. I'm pretty psyched about it.
TV has gotten perhaps better than your average film script, but at the same time, it's fun to give it all you've got for a few months and produce a story.
What Tim does is, he calls me and sends me the script. And then he sends me a drawing, an illustration of his image of me as the character. It's so great.
I'll tell you God's truth: I think that this script that Neil has written - 'Odd Couple Two,' I think, is superior to the original one - to the first one.
I think I do have a good eye. It's quite liberating, being in a position to read a script and say, 'No.' It's really the only power you have, as an actor.
But I have a list of books that I want to read before I die, and whenever I get time to read something that isn't a script, I'll read something from that.
While I don't script and I don't use other performers, I think my taste for underlying precision gives me something in common with Allan and George Brecht.
If you get a book which is 600 pages, you have to reduce it to a script of 100 pages. In two hours of film, you cannot possibly include all the characters.
Even before my audition, there were several pages missing from my script because those bits were so unbelievably secret not even I was allowed to see them.
I watch a lot of TV - 'Perfect Strangers,' 'Family Matters,' 'Who's the Boss?' - then I go over my notes in the script, lock it into my head and go to bed.
Talent is a combination of perfect comic timing, diction, modulation, great script writing and most importantly, an invincible will, if you may call it so.
They have become part of us in that if we get dressed up as them, we don't actually have to have a script. You can just become them. You just become nervy.
I think a playwright realizes after he finishes working on the script that this is only the beginning. What will happen when it moves into three dimensions?
Actually when I gave out the script, I gave it with a CD of all the music I wanted to put in the movie, and again, we never thought we'd get all that music.
I dropped the script in the fireplace, called my agent and said, they can jail me, sue me, but I'm never acting again, unless I can do something worthwhile.
I get nervous before openings or premieres or when someone's reading a new script, and I get nervous when my daughter isn't in my immediate field of vision.
I've been spoiled by this project. I was given the script and went in to read, realizing that this was a powerful story and one that wasn't told very often.
I read the script and decide if a particular character looks fun to play. I look for complexity and a sense of humor. Those are crucial, real things to life.
With 'Deep Space Nine,' I learned that when you get a script, you should give honor to the writer. On 'Larry Sanders,' even on '24,' you could make up stuff.
You can have a great character in a really bad script, and the film will never be seen. It's just too much work to commit to a film and not have it released.
During the inception of 'Zindagi Gulzar Hai,' we studied the characters and the script in depth so that we could imbibe the essence of it in our performance.
To me, movies and music go hand in hand. When I'm writing a script, one of the first things I do is find the music I'm going to play for the opening sequence.
Normally when I'm sent a script I'll read it through to see how it hangs as a story and then I'll go back and read it through again and look at the character.
I never practice before, I never work hours on a script. I just choose my characters and trust them, and after that, it's about the director taking your hand.
Getting movies made is not as difficult as people think. Making movies is easy. You get a script, you get a director, you raise the money, you make the movie.
I try to research or make up for myself what happened in any character's life. From when he was born until the first page of the script. I fill in the blanks.