Theatre Quotes

I think actors have a greater responsibility when doing comedy. It's as easy as anything to get cheap laughs, but that's not the idea at all. "The slight trip syndrome," we call it. With tragedy one can get away with things a bit more because audiences don't always know how to react.

I have no intention of uttering my last words on the stage. Room service and a couple of depraved young women will do me quite nicely for an exit.

The Civic Theater idea, as a distinctive issue, implies the conscious awakening of a people to self-government in the activities of its leisure. To this end, organization of the arts of the theater, participation by the people in these arts not mere spectatorship, a new resulting technique, leadership by means of a permanent staff of artists (not of merchants in art), elimination of private profit by endowment and public support, dedication in the service to the whole community: these are chief among its essentials, and these imply a new and nobler scope for the art of the theater itself. [1912]

Playwriting isn't a calling so much as it is a hazing process.

The Actor should make you forget the existence of author and director, and even forget the actor.

When actors go onstage, you know immediately if they can do their job. You can be a lawyer or an accountant for years and not find out.

Has anybody ever seen a dramatic critic in the daytime? Of course not. They come out after dark, up to no good.

The number of people who will not go to a show they do not want to see is unlimited.

The stage is not merely the meeting place of all the arts, but is also the return of art to life.