Charlie Kaufman Quotes

What I write is emotionally honest and truthful as the human experience can be, to make people feel less alone, or at least that's the hope.

Weirdly enough, I don't like to pretend. I try to use things in me, and translate them into the situation and the characters, so it always needs to run through my own veins.

Fiction, at its best, is a radical act of intimacy. It seeks to join, to merge, to know deeply; and, as with intimacy, there is a way in which it cannot be faked.

I think that people respond to honesty in music, so I only choose songs that are the truth for me.

As a fan, I connect with realness. Whether it's strong or vulnerable, if it's real, I can connect with it.

Even if you can't relate to what I'm singing, I hope you can believe in it and see it as something that it is real.

I've listened to 'Frank' so many times. She was so honest and herself. I think one of the hardest things for an artist to do is tell the truth, but that's what Amy Winehouse did, and it's what I want to do - if you want to write songs that connect with people, I think they really need to believe what you're talking about.

What I like about stand-up is, it's truthful. I'm not up there trying to get laid or look cool. I'm up there because I really love it, and it makes people happier.

At a certain age you start becoming brave enough to reveal yourself and it's the revealing of who you are that enables you to dig deeper into different characters. You'll get to a point where you can say: 'I can relate to that', 'I know that', 'I don't have to make that up' and that resonates with people in the audience who can tell that you've been there.

I want to be loved despite my faults. It isn't exactly true that I'm a provocateur. A real provocateur is someone who says things he doesn't think, just to shock. I try to say what I think.

Music to me is about being honest, and it's what I've always pictured music as. I don't see the point of expressing yourself if you are going to be cryptic about it.

Even when I do commercials, I try to tell a story about the product. With music, I try to tell the story of the person's struggle for success. And I believe every word I say. I never read anything on the air I don't believe in. I think people sense that about me, and they respond to it.

People see truth in my films. That's what they react to, and that's what they relate to.

If you show you're human and have something to say, people will connect with you.

I hope they see the genuine side of me, of my music, of my voice. I hope that they feel me. I hope that what I sing and what I say really gets across to the viewer because everything that comes out is true.

To be honest with my music... for me to expect anyone to connect it has to come from a place of honesty.

As I found again and again as a writer, when you're completely honest about something, people respond to that.

It's just about being honest. I listen to a lot of stuff that's out there, some of which I wrote, and I'm like, 'Where is that? Where's the honesty?' So that's what I want to get to in my music now.

People come to the theatre in search of a real encounter with other human beings, and we must give them what they come for. Our capacity to do that is the measure of being human. And if the price is that we sometimes say something not very pleasant - well, that's precisely why people want us, in the end: because we speak the truth.

Honesty and vulnerability endear us to people; they don't endanger us in our relationship.

When you do something that's going to speak to people, it's going to be because you're really allowing all of yourself to the table in an accepting way.

I've never been one of those to kind of like, 'I want somebody to do something against their nature to titillate me.' That never holds any interest. And I always want people to be who they are and if they're being not who they are I feel like it's false and, therefore, less easy to connect to. I don't need them to kiss or to display physical intimacy. I think that almost becomes too obvious. I love playing in the suggestive.

The minute you try to do something that is not true to you, is not something that you really know about, and is not a lifestyle or world that you live in or can relate to, it's going to come off as false.

Write straight into the emotional center of things. Write toward vulnerability. Don't worry about appearing sentimental. Worry about being unavailable; worry about being absent or fraudulent.

Autobiography is not important. Authenticity is important. The writer must fire herself through the text, be the molten stuff that welds together disparate elements. I believe there is always exposure, vulnerability, in the writing process, which is not to say it is either confessional or memoir. Simply, it is real.