Lynn Nottage Quotes

Writing a play, you start with less, so more is demanded of you. It's as if you have to not only write a symphony, but invent the instruments as well.

As a writer, all you want to do is write for great actors. That's all.

I did plays in college, and I have half of a play. But I'm kind of stuck. I keep revisiting it so maybe it will move somewhere. There's something about plays where you can feel that sense of artifice at any moment.

I always have something big enough to say as a playwright. It's storytelling.

Writing plays, I've always felt a little like I'm guessing - less sure of what's good and what's not good. I think that's because it's not a complete work of art.

I'm more rooted in new plays and new writing.

If you are opening a play, a play that's really about something, a play that's really about ideas, you have to find a way to sell that play.

I thought I wanted to be a playwright because I was interested in stories and telling stories.

I think the script is the key. Regardless of how great everybody else is working on a film, if you're working on a script that you don't think is great, you're not gonna be able to make a great film. Whereas if the script is great, then you can.

It's bad writing, however naturalistic it's written, that's where you have to do your best acting.

It's well known that actors are lousy writers.

Lizzy Weiss is such a great writer, and she really writes for the performances.

I always write the script by myself.

I consider my job as a screenwriter to pack a script with possibilities and ideas - to create a feast for the filmmaker to pick from.

For me, a play is a form of writing which isn't complete until it is interpreted by actors. But it's still a form of writing. And so most of my time is spent thinking about how to write a sentence.

I started writing because it was hard to find acting jobs. I didn't like any monologues in auditions, so I started to write my own things. Since then, I have written a couple of shows. I was nominated for playwright of the year for a play I wrote called 'Potential Space.'

If I'm not clear with the character, I can't do anything with it. But once I get that character, the possibilities are endless. When you have such a defined character, I feel like I can actually read the phone book and make it funny.

The hardest single thing you do is get the bloody screenplay right.

I love writing plays because they are living, fluid things that are energised by the producer, designers, musicians, actors and audience.

The instinct to impersonate produces the actor; the desire to provide pleasure by impersonations produces the playwright; the desire to provide this pleasure with adequate characterization and dialogue memorable in itself produces dramatic literature.

Playwrights are naturally wary and protective - God, who's more protective than a playwright? You read a play, the playwright wants to hear from you immediately.

I write plays instinctively. I don't like writing movie scripts.

Somebody wrote a script around us, but Dustin Abraham came with the best one.

Writing a play, you have to retain it all in your head - you need more time. With prose, you can snatch an hour here, an hour there.

When I wrote 'Kidulthood,' I didn't even know there was going to be a 'Kidulthood.' I just wanted to test myself to see if I could write a script.