Script Assessment Quotes

Normally, when I read a script, it takes me two and a half hours. I usually put it down and come back to it. So, I know if I can read a script in one sitting, it's a fantastic script.

It might be different for people that are A-list actors, but a lot of us really look at what's offered to us and look for something that has some traction with other people. But, it's not like I read 100 scripts a week, and then pick and choose. Maybe some actors do. I certainly don't do that.

I wasn't involved, except to the degree that they sent me drafts of the script as the writer turned them in. They asked me at one point to write a memo about what I thought of it.

When it comes to scripts, I take a critical look at them and then sound it off with Dad.

When you start out as an actor, you read a script thinking of it at its best. But that's not usually the case in general, and usually what you have to do is you have to read a script and think of it at its worst. You read it going, "OK, how bad could this be?" first and foremost. You cannot make a good film out of a bad script. You can make a bad film out of a good script, but you can't make a good film out of a bad script.

If the script is boring when I read it, I am sure it would be boring onscreen, too.

I'd rather say no and have said no and do say no often. I walk away from projects if it doesn't feel right; if it's not the right team of people pulling in together or if the script isn't right. It could be a great idea but the script doesn't work.

I think first impressions are important when you pick up a script.

If a movie doesn't even have financing yet, they'll do a table read for it at a casting director's office with actors, for the producer and the writer, just to hear if the movie is working.

I can now tell from the envelope whether or not it is a good script.

I look at scripts as good or bad. If it's bad, it better pay a lot of money.

I'm getting more selective, the more I do. As an actor, you want to do a variety of things, but first and foremost, it's the script, the quality of the script and the part. If the script is great and it's a part that I believe and I believe the world, that's rarer than you think.

Finding a good script is really difficult and the scariest thing of all is when they say about a script that's not right, "we will fix it.." It's like before you get on the Titanic and you see a big hole. In process, it's too late.

You liked the freshness of it, c'mon try it" and I said "oh God, I read it three of four times" and finally I said "all right, I want you guys to organize a reading and I want you to be there to see how terrible this is not going to work at all", so we had a table like this, and read the script, and it was just great.

You read a lot of pilots during pilot season, and not all of them really grab you.

I keep an open mind when a script is narrated to me.

You really get a feeling, when you're reading scripts, pretty quickly. Within 20 or 25 pages, you can get a sense of the part. I always think about whether I'm right for it and whether I can do it. If I don't think I'm right for it, it should go to somebody else.

Oftentimes you read scripts, and you get to one and you think, 'OK, is this good, or is this just better than all the other ones that I have been reading?'

A lot of people have an opinion on scripts, but they aren't equipped to diagnose what the problems are. You realize that scriptwriting is such a specialist subject, but because it's so common, everyone thinks that they can talk about that. I think it's something that writers only know, that they can see.

It's got to be a challenge but at the same time you have to feel as though you can play them - it's really dangerous to want to be a part of something just because you think it's going to be great. I've been sent plenty of scripts where I've known that it's going to be a great film and a successful one, but I just couldn't convince myself that I was the right person for the part. So, I think you have to be careful with that.