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" Lyrics have to be underwritten. That's why poets generally make poor lyric writers because the language is too rich. You get drowned in it. "

Stephen Sondheim

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" I don't listen to recordings of my songs. I don't avoid it, I just don't go out of my way to do it. "

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" I have inherited my father's sense of humour about myself. It's a lot more pleasant to make fun of yourself than when someone else does. "

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" Musical comedies aren't written, they are rewritten. "

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" I'm a great audience. I cry very easily. I suspend disbelief in two seconds. "

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" My personal life and my artistic life do not interfere with each other. "

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" I really don't want to write a score until the whole show is cast and staged. "

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" Making lyrics feel natural, sit on music in such a way that you don't feel the effort of the author, so that they shine and bubble and rise and fall, is very, very hard to do. Whereas you can sit at the piano and just play and feel you're making art. "

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" When I was growing up, there was no such thing as Off-Broadway. You either got your show on or you didn't. "

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" Math and music are intimately related. Not necessarily on a conscious level, but sure. "

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" I certainly wanted my name in lights. I wanted my name on a marquee. I wanted recognition on Broadway. "

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" I happen to like movies and plays about dislikeable people as long as I get to know why they are what they are. "

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" When you know your cast well and their strengths and weaknesses, you can start writing for them, just the way Shakespeare wrote for his actors. "

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" I was essentially trained by Oscar Hammerstein to think of songs as one-act plays, to move a song from point A to point B dramatically. "

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" Oscar Hammerstein was a surrogate father during all those many days, and weeks and months when I didn't see my own father. "

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" You can't have personal investors anymore because it's too expensive, so you have to have corporate investment or a lot of rich people. "

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" Every time one can write a self-deluded song, you are way ahead of the game, way ahead. Self-delusion is the basis of nearly all the great scenes in all the great plays, from 'Oedipus' to 'Hamlet.' "

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" I prefer neurotic people. I like to hear rumblings beneath the surface. "

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" Two of the hardest words in the language to rhyme are life and love. Of all words! "

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" Everyone I used to play with has either given up or is dead. "

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" There's something inimical about the camera and song. "

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" If you're dealing with a musical in which you're trying to tell a story, it's got to sound like speech. At the same time it's got to be a song. "

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" I would have been a geologist. "

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" I'm interested in the theater because I'm interested in communication with audiences. Otherwise I would be in concert music. "

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" When I'm writing a song, I try to be the character. "

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" I'm always conscious of what I'm writing, conscious of what the actor may ask me. I have a defense for nearly every line in the song. "

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" My idea of heaven is not writing. "

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" On stage, generally speaking, the story is stopped or held back by songs, because that's the convention. Audiences enjoy the song and the singer, that's the point. "

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" I was raised to be charming, not sincere. "

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" When the audience comes in, it changes the temperature of what you've written. "

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" If people have split views about your work, I think it's flattering. I'd rather have them feel something about it than dismiss it. "

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