Laurence Housman Quotes

A prose writer never sees a reader walk out of a book; for a playwright, it's another matter. An audience is an invaluable education. In my experience, theatre artists don't know what they've made until they've made it.

I write things in my house, and hopefully there's a reader out there who enjoys it and has an experience with it, but that's very different than a performer on stage, where there's an immediate dance with the audience. It's incredibly powerful.

In preschool, I would plan out my show-and-tell every week to be funny and exciting. Then in first grade I wrote a play, and my classmates and I performed it as a puppet show.

I read my books to writing workshops and friends, and I'm often focussed just on keeping them entertained. I never think about marketing at all.

I wanted to be an actress. I think it had a lot to do with being a kid and watching how every time my dad would stand up to talk people would applaud... that was pretty cool.

When I was 3, I recited a poem at a festival in Passaic, New Jersey. The applause was tremendous, and it hit me that I could affect people positively by performing.

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.

There's something about being in a house with an audience, and having that immediate feedback. I started acting because of that energy; it's what feeds me on stage and informs my choices.

It takes a while to get a show on, and I've a number that have not yet been produced. I want to see all of them produced spectacularly before I pack it in.

I would love to do more TV and do movies for the experience, but my ultimate focus is stand-up. It's the number one thing that I love most because there is nothing like being with a live audience.

I always try to make sure that I stay connected to theater so I continue to be inspired. Not that I'm not inspired by television.

A playwright can drop a little acid in the water and it washes away a lot of rust.

I consume a lot of television and a lot of movies, and I love watching other actors work and am just very inspired by it.

Reading is how I became an actor because I didn't grow up in a house where there was an awareness of film or theater. I also grew up in a house full of teachers, so reading was big in our world.

After 'Superstar,' I was encouraged. I felt audiences wanted to be challenged.

In third grade, my teacher asked me to read in front of the class. I was so touched because that really was the first acting I had ever done, just reading in front of the class. And I was so amazed with the fulfillment I got from being in front of people.

I don't know what really makes a great musical or not. In the end, you write it, and you write it because you want to write it.

When the opportunity came along to do 'Win, Lose or Draw,' I took it selfishly to find out if I did enjoy being me on camera. And I did that for the last two years I was doing 'Mama's Family.'

The stage always terrified me. The live audience is just one thing I bewilderingly look back on and say, 'How did I ever participate in that?'

There's nothing more thrilling than watching great actors say things that you wrote and bring them to life.

I feel powerful when I'm onstage talking to an audience. I like communicating; it feels like my calling in the world. Knowing what you're meant to be doing with your life is pretty bloody powerful.

I wanted the audience to write stories and then read them out if they wanted to. It's always the best part of the show because people are so imaginative.

Sadly, I haven't been able to find my earliest stories, but the impact of being told by someone important to me that I could do something special is immeasurable.

At the age of 11 I did my first open mic show, and it was one of those lightning-bolt moments where I suddenly found what I wanted to do.

I think Shakespeare, at his heart, was just the way all of us are that make movies: He wanted to entertain people.