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" I am so superstitious that I think even discussing this subject is dangerous and will probably bring me terrible luck. Having been raised a Catholic, superstition becomes almost part of your DNA. The challenge is to slowly rid yourself of these little delusions. "

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" I have three favorite cities: London, Wellington, and Los Angeles. What makes them so good? The friends who live there. "

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" It's impossible to make a living in the arts unless you make a fortune. There's almost no in-between. Writers are either broke or rolling in it. Oddly, you can't tell them apart. "

" At 17, I wanted to be a rock star. "

" Life is not a waste of time. "

" Since my student days, I'd been a fan of those books with titles like 'Great Speeches that Changed the World,' as I loved the idea that the right person with the right words at the right time could really make a difference. "

" When I grew up, my house contained only two books: the Bible and the 'Edmonds' cookbook. We were a working-class household. Books were a poor second to the television, which was always on, usually with me in front of it. "

" One of the real ways out of conflict is humour. It builds bridges; it's a weapon against rigid ideology, narrow thinking, intolerance. "

" My routine is to create activities for myself unrelated to writing that allow little time for writing. This means that when I do get the chance to write, it is like a stolen luxury, something clandestine and almost forbidden. "

" Truth is seldom appreciated and never understood, whereas a flattering lie is always appreciated and instantly understood. "

" Before Churchill had done anything else, he was a writer. He believed to the core that words matter. They count. They can change the world. "

" Reading is essential to human life. When the last reader dies, humanity will be at an end. "

" The New Zealand sense of humor is tough and realistic. Jokes are not surreal; they are about life and death and tough decisions. "

" I'm still always surprised that anyone might be interested in my work or me. "

Anthony McCarten

Always

Work

" Be more ambitious. Do your homework. There's no easy way around this. "

" You can't write a character more brilliant than yourself. It's just not physically possible. "

" Most writers live in self-imposed exile, even when they don't leave their country. They prefer the undiscovered country inside their own heads. "

" If you look at the copies of Churchill's speeches that have survived, they are heavily marked up. He was scrupulous about the impact of each word. He preferred short words and the repetition of short words. He knew everything about the techniques of rhetoric. "

Anthony McCarten

Short

Look

" I was born to a very large family, one of 7 kids. I grew up with carnivals and chaos all around me, so I can write anywhere. "

Anthony McCarten

I Can

Write

" The more I read about the rules the great orators used, the more I realised, of course, this is how you stir people's hearts, and you persuade and cajole and move people out of fixed positions. The techniques are quite menacingly easy. "

" As you get older, you become more vain. But as your looks slowly deteriorate, your eyesight worsens, so it all balances out. "

" There is the cult of the actor and of the director, and there's even been the cult of the celebrity chef and gardener, but there has never been a cult of the screenwriter. But I'm happy about that because what I crave - in a completely venal way - is creative opportunities, not recognition. "

" If we did not have the impulse and ability to believe in the impossible, we would not have religion, democracy, or marriage. "

" Commercial success and quality are not necessarily allied. "

" There's a really fine line between artistic license and artistic licentiousness. And history is a lousy filmmaker. It doesn't give you all the ingredients you need. No story will quite fulfill that three-act structure. "