It's funny how seeing a love story never gets boring, because it's the dream, isn't it? It's the dream to have a true connection with another human being.
My mother used to tell this corny story about how the doctor smacked me on the behind when I was born and I thought it was applause, and I have been looking for it ever since.
If you read a story with an 'I' or a 'he' or a 'she,' you're in familiar territory - but 'we' is mostly unexplored. I think of 'we' as an adventure.
In a crime story, the details become tremendously important - where the staircase was in relation to the bed, for example.
I think, in the grand epic, Jesus is the hero of our stories. And our stories, as they were, are subplots in a grand epic and our job is not to be the hero of any story. Our job is to be a saint in a story that he is telling.
It's important for cinema to keep on evolving: for people, and not only teenagers, to be able to go to a movie that has huge epic scope but has an intellectual and real story to tell.
I do this acting thing mostly for myself. I like to make a connection and communicate with the audience to make myself feel less lonely. I also do it to develop my own character, so sometimes I do it to just be away in a certain area that I've never been to. But mostly, the story has to do something for me.
The act of reading a story is sacred, and people build images and all that stuff.
If I have a male protagonist, it's a studio movie, and if it's a female protagonist, it's an indie movie. That's just how it is. It's not about the studios. It's about America and who goes to see movies. Women are interested in men and women, and men aren't interested in the woman's story. They just aren't.
People write fiction in their minds all the time - every time we read a 'human interest' news story, or a true crime tale, we find ourselves fascinated because we're trying to understand why people behave the way they do, why they make the choices they do, how we become who we become.
One of the pillars of 'Cyrano' is recreating a love story and, like any archetype, these great stories tend to be captivating, among other things, because they are made of those universal things that move us.
I think that there is not really a difference between a 'Peanuts' and a beautiful Renaissance painting. There is something very romantic in the 'Peanuts' - it's at the same level of a novel or a Jane Austen story or a beautiful embroidered rose fabric. It is a piece of romanticism.
I really do believe some people are naturally novelists and some people are short story writers. For me, when I was in middle school or high school, I started with novels.
At the end of the day, the job is to tell the story that you promised to tell and do it in the most entertaining and perhaps surprising way you can think of.
Even if a story has nothing to do with my life, if I can recognise something of myself in the character and think, 'Oh yeah, that's what I'd do...' Yeah, that's what I look for.
The decision to kiss for the first time is the most crucial in any love story. It changes the relationship of two people much more strongly than even the final surrender; because this kiss already has within it that surrender.
Because I grew up on 'Star Wars', that was the best example of creating a full and rich world to me as a writer. When I was watching those movies as a kid, I wanted to know more about every damn character in that universe. There was always a hint that there was a story there that you just weren't getting to see.
The biggest challenge for me has been in coping with my perfectionism. I have a stiflingly hard time moving forward in a project if it's not 'just right' all along the way. The trap I so easily fall into is rewriting and rewriting the same scenes over and over to make them perfect, instead of continuing on into the wild unknown of the story.
Very often when a story really holds us, it gets pushed away because it's too close for comfort.
I have definitely been curious and involved in the process; even as a young actor. I was always looking at where the camera was, what story it was telling. And as my experience grew, I wanted to know even more.
I know this will blow your mind, but most people would probably never ever get it, but I listen to classical music when nobody else is around. It calms me down and I can get into this, like, deep thinking mode, you know, because there's really no lyrics to it, so you're not following something that - that you're listening to a story.
It seems like every year Hollywood makes an attempt to retell the Manson story, and I just couldn't be less interested in it. It's not really our crowning achievement as a civilisation. I'm not saying it shouldn't be done, but it just bores me.
I feel 'The Night Circus' has a complete story arc in one book. I like it as a single volume. It feels complete to me, and I wouldn't want to stretch it out into something it's not.
When the story is good enough, people can watch something three times the length of an opera.
I like to allow a story to arise as I'm writing scripts. I find it horrible when I try to think of something for the plot without really being on the ground and seeing where it goes.
In fifth grade, we had to write a story and read it in front of the class. When I read mine out, the class were just belly laughing. And I remember being like, 'This is the coolest!' So I want to dedicate my life to trying to make people laugh. I can't imagine doing anything else.
When tragedy strikes, or even when it looms, our families will have the opportunity to look into our hearts to see whether we know what we said we knew. Our children will watch, feel the Spirit confirm that we lived as we preached, remember that confirmation, and pass the story across the generations.
People like to build their own story about my life. I don't know if it makes them feel better, or if it makes it okay for them to not like me, but the last thing I grew up as was rich.
AI don't make a big thing out of my race. If you try to preach, people give you a little sympathy and then they want to get out of the way. So you don't preach; you tell the story.
Every different director has another language - for instance, Hitchcock does not like any bright color ever, unless the story says 'there goes the girl in a red dress.'
'Letters From Home' is a story inspired by my grandparents' epistolary courtship.
Emotionally, in our minds, we get so filled with resentments where we've got a story about absolutely everything.
Cinema and the arts invite viewers to focus on a story and, in doing so, peel away its layers and peer into the depths of the human soul.
My life has been pretty unconventional. The publishers saw a story in it, and yes, my life has been put in a book.
I'm not very good at story. In fact, compared to character and language, I barely care about story at all.
If technology and medicine are used by women to have children or not to have children or to have healthier children - that's one thing. But if it's used to say, 'You're not a real woman unless you have a child; therefore, take all these dangerous hormones and have one at 54,' then it's another story.
