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" The more restrictions you have, the easier anything is to write. "

Stephen Sondheim

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" Every writer I've ever spoken to feels fraudulent in some way or other. "

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" All the best performers bring to their role something more, something different than what the author put on paper. That's what makes theatre live. That's why it persists. "

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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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" One difference between poetry and lyrics is that lyrics sort of fade into the background. They fade on the page and live on the stage when set to music. "

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

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" Art, in itself, is an attempt to bring order out of chaos. "

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

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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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" My mother wanted me off her hands. She was a working woman. She designed clothes, and she was a celebrity collector. It's my mother's ambition to be a celebrity. "

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

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" So many good songs get written fast, because you know exactly what has to work. "

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" The fact is popular art dates. It grows quaint. How many people feel strongly about Gilbert and Sullivan today compared to those who felt strongly in 1890? "

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" I fell into lyric writing because of music. I backed into it. "

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" The nice thing about doing a crossword puzzle is, you know there is a solution. "

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" One of the hardest things about writing lyrics is to make the lyrics sit on the music in such a way that you're not aware there was a writer there. "

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" A close-up on screen can say all a song can. "

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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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" 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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" 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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" If you force yourself to write away from the piano, you come up with more inventive things. If you're too good a piano player, as some composers are, the music may become flavorless and glib. And if you're not a very good pianist, you're limited to the same patterns. "

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

Stephen Sondheim

" I have, by nature, an analytical mind. "

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" Musicals are, by nature, theatrical, meaning poetic, meaning having to move the audience's imagination and create a suspension of disbelief, by which I mean there's no fourth wall. "

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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.' "

Stephen Sondheim

" I think 'lunch' is one of the funniest words in the world. "

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