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" Some filmmakers set out to re-create the theater experience they got on Broadway. They kept everything the same. They shot the original casts. We reinvent the whole thing, look at it solely as a movie. We pretend that nobody saw 'Chicago' or 'Hairspray.' "

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" Neil and I had the greatest experience of our lives doing 'Chicago' with Latifah. Then we had the second best experience of our lives doing 'Hairspray.' "

Craig Zadan

Doing

Experience

Best

" He's perfect for anything. I would hire Hugh Jackman to come to my house and have dinner. "

" When you work on a passion project, there's always the chance that you'll get your heart broken. "

" I don't think we're going to break the law in terms of what you can or can't do on TV. We're looking to do something edgy, different, and special. "

" If anything's going to go wrong, it'd go wrong during 'Peter Pan,' not 'The Sound of Music.' "

Craig Zadan

Wrong

Sound

" Basically, we had the idea of doing this production of 'Steel Magnolias,' and we spoke to Queen Latifah about it, and she got excited. "

" Neil and I share a desire for great quality in our work. If we are offered projects, look at projects, or consider projects that don't have that quality, then we don't do them. "

" The reality of producing the Oscars is that it's a blood sport. With social media, everyone has a chance to voice their opinions. You have to know that entering into this special world requires a very thick skin. "

" I was captivated by Stephanie Mills. "

Craig Zadan

Mills

Captivated

" I think maybe the most important thing that we have to say is that people don't often talk about network executives being brave. You don't talk about them as having integrity and a higher purpose, because it's a job... except for Bob Greenblatt. He is a theatre person. He loves and understands it. "

" Live TV is the future. It's the only way you can beat the DVRing of America. Everything is DVRed, and no one watches stuff when it's on. Awards shows and sports are watched when they're broadcast. "

" When we went to Judy Davis and said, 'We want you to play Judy Garland in the mini-series 'Life With Judy Garland,' she was shocked, but we just had an instinct about her. "

" A lot of people feel that 'Music Man' is a good movie musical. "

" The future for us is not to go bigger but to go different. "

Craig Zadan

Different

Bigger

" We've spoken to a lot of friends who are stars who could be great, and they say to us, 'Look, if you were doing a movie musical, and we could pre-record and lip-synch, sure. But live? So if we hit a bad note it's there for posterity? We're not going to go out there without a safety net.' People are scared to death of that. "

" We'd never do 'The Sound of Music' because the movie was perfect. "

" We couldn't even contemplate doing 'Hairspray' without a live audience. "

" The truth of the matter is - when we look at things - every movie we do - no matter what the subject matter is - we go to the universal theme of family. We always go to that because if the movie is about family, then any audience can relate to it. "

" It's expensive to produce musicals on television. "

" We're finding that the casting of 'A Few Good Men' is different from the musicals because the kind of actors that you need to do it are movie actors, basically. "

" It rests in the hands of 'Dreamgirls' and 'Hairspray.' If they're successful, we'll be back on track - people will continue to greenlight musicals. If they don't work, then you're going to see everyone go back to the way it was before 'Chicago.' "

" We wanted to take on social and political and LGBTQ stories which no one at the upper level of the entertainment industry ever really wants to do. So you have to fight, and you have to persuade, and you have to manipulate the studios and the networks. And you have to go back - over and over again - until they say yes. "

" People think, 'Oh, you're doing 'The Wiz' because 'Empire' is such a big hit.' The truth is, staging this musical has been a dream of ours since the '90s, but the rights were tied up. It's just coincidental that, this year, when we were choosing a new musical, the rights were cleared. "

" I think we sublimated our Broadway desires by doing theater in Hollywood - not on stage but by doing the movies of 'Chicago' and 'Hairspray' and also musicals on TV. We did Rodgers and Hammerstein's 'Cinderella' and 'Gypsy' and 'Annie.' Even 'Smash' was like doing theater. "

" It was very, very difficult to be a student in the drama department and also review my professors' school shows. I got a lot of pressure from them to quit the paper and concentrate on studying dramatic literature. "

" We have a great musical sequence in episode five of 'Smash' called 'Let's Be Bad,' and it probably is the closest to 'Chicago' that I think any of us have ever experienced. "

" The people with mean things to say, say them. At the end of the day, the mean things and the good things only drive viewership. So what do you want? You want the ratings. "

" To battle the odds - loss of interest, no funding, discouragement - requires someone who doesn't give up. "

" We have a particular philosophy in the casting room that we don't really tell the actors - the actors tell us. "

Craig Zadan

Philosophy

Casting

" We'd go to studios with ideas to do movie musicals and they'd literally kick us out. They said, 'Audiences aren't interested in movie musicals. You're wasting our time.' "