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" I love working with actors who will just go, 'Oh O.K., let's try it and see where it goes,' and 'Let's see what we can discover.' "

George C. Wolfe

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" I personally am a very big fan of 'Romeo + Juliet.' It had a visceral power to it that I thought was just exhilarating. It was a very arresting and very disturbing and deeply compelling version of the play. "

George C. Wolfe

" Racists are deficient as human beings. "

George C. Wolfe

" The best of any artist is in their art. "

George C. Wolfe

" I love working with a set designer because, in many respects, you meet the set designer before you meet the actors. So it's a chance for me as a director to figure out what I'm thinking and to explore how the space is going to actually be activated. "

George C. Wolfe

" A lot of directors tend to manipulate actors' vulnerability to get what they want, and that can work. "

George C. Wolfe

" I was obsessed with New York early on. I was watching sitcoms that were set in or around New York, like 'The Dick Van Dyke Show.' I was always very fascinated with the people who were on 'What's My Line?' and I always had an incredible obsession with the city. "

George C. Wolfe

" When I came to New York, I told everyone I was a writer/director, and they said, 'No.' There was a rule. You could be one or the other. They ordained me writer. But then I won the Obie for directing 'Spunk,' and the rules changed. "

George C. Wolfe

" A musical is what happens when text collides with motion collides with song collides with spectacle. And spectacle can be the human heart; it doesn't necessarily have to be a helicopter crashing. "

George C. Wolfe

" I think there's an aspect of my soul, of my personality, that's very suited to directing. I like being in the room with actors; I love creating a safe space and a chaotic space for the discovery to take place. I love creating a sense of community. "

George C. Wolfe

" Producing has empowered me as an artist in a specific way. It's forced a certain kind of maturity. "

George C. Wolfe

" I really don't find revivals very interesting because I like new work a lot. I feel like if you're going to pay me, then let me do what I do and let me try to solve some problems. Let me try to make something fly. Why would I do something that everybody has already done the hard work on? But that's me. Tons of people do revivals really well. "

George C. Wolfe

" The only rule of a musical is that it must maintain its buoyancy. "

George C. Wolfe

" Musicals spring forth from minstrelsy, vaudeville, melodramas; it was all these things combined to create the form. "

George C. Wolfe

" I'm interested in exploring how an individual maintains a sense of power in a world that tends to make individuals feel powerless. "

George C. Wolfe

" There is a real affection for these human beings on these stage that O'Neill really had. Out of that affection comes a lot of humor, which is unexpected when you think of 'The Iceman Cometh.' "

George C. Wolfe

" Our lives are connected in ways we can't imagine. They're connected even before we know they're connected. "

George C. Wolfe

" Ultimately, theatre is about creating a sense of wonder, and I think wonder is achieved not by a kind of wide-eyed silliness but by being available to that which is most unknown, inside the material and inside yourself. "

George C. Wolfe

" Always, when I do a play, there's got to be an equation of risks and potential failure. When you're working on a new play, it's like, 'How the hell do I do this, and do we have the time?' All of these huge questions engage, hopefully, the smartest part of me. And then when you're doing a revival, I went, 'Well, somebody's already solved it.' "

George C. Wolfe

" To me, 'Show Boat' was the first American musical, the first to have the real texture of this country. "

George C. Wolfe

" A music serves truth up to you in a really interesting way that allows you to luxuriate in its beauty and, at the same time, to hopefully see yourself in its fragility. "

George C. Wolfe

" I came to New York to write and direct, and when I got here, a lot of my rage came out. "

George C. Wolfe

" In the early '90s or so, I drove my father to Providence, Ky., his hometown, and he was pointing out, 'That's where the doctor's office was,' and 'That's where we bought ice cream.' And he was pointing to empty lots. When you lose communities, what do you have? We often survive by remembering the stories. "

George C. Wolfe

" I'm more attracted to art that smashes than I am attracted to art that sits on a shelf and is beautiful. "

George C. Wolfe

" Commercial theater, in its agenda to appeal to everybody, is often at the expense of the unique vision of the artist. "

George C. Wolfe

" Everybody wants to be remembered for the best of who they are. "

George C. Wolfe

" Growing up in the South, I was raised to be a Negro boy. I was acutely aware how other people perceived me, and that informed my behavior. That worked for a period of time, but it could also be suffocating. "

George C. Wolfe

" I could program a 'fabulous, I love it' kind of hit season right now. I'm more interested in breaking boundaries, telling a story, defying a truth that has been accepted. "

George C. Wolfe

" I pride myself on being available to as many people's stories as I possibly can. "

George C. Wolfe

" Every single wave, when I was overwhelmed and poor and struggling in New York, there were these extraordinary people in New York who said, 'Come this way.' "

George C. Wolfe

" Surviving failure is one thing. Surviving success is... is challenging, with the consequences and what you lose along the way. "

George C. Wolfe