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" The worst thing when you're working is to say, 'I have a question,' and the other person goes, 'No! This is what it is.' That kind of rigidity is very challenging because musicals are constantly mutating. "

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" 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

Way

New York

Said

" I don't go, like, 'Hmm, I'm now going to create something for the black community.' I just feel this compelling urge. I just feel myself drawn to stories that I feel have a potency and immediacy. "

" There is a strange kind of parental pride when 'Topdog' ends up on Broadway, or 'Elaine Stritch.' "

" 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.' "

" Theater should address the stories of its communities, or I don't know why it's here. "

" Anytime you create art, you create a mess. I mean, 'Hamlet' is a mess! "

" 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

Than

" Confidence comes in going on personal journeys in a public arena and feeling as though you have a right to do that. You have to give yourself permission to discover what you need to discover and not worry about how pretty the journey is. If you're aware of the pretty, you're not going to dig into the mess. "

" In Los Angeles, wealth and poverty are separated by the freeways. In New York, they're next to each other. "

" 'Jelly,' more than any black musical before it, celebrated the majesty, the purity, the joy of so many artists who are unable to fully embody these same qualities in their own lives. "

" I've always tried to do shows in a filmic way. I like it when forms smack up against each other. "

" I feel like I've been very blessed in the sense that I've had the veracity of spirit to not be stopped and, at the same time, the protective energy and the generosity of those who have come before me, who saw something inside of me and, therefore, invited me into rooms that I would not have been inside of otherwise. "

George C. Wolfe

Generosity

Time

" AIDS is a shared truth - it's not selective in its wrath. "

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

" When you're writing, in theory, everybody is serving you. When you're directing, you're serving everybody - in the guise of acting like everybody's serving you. But you're really serving the materials. You're serving the actors. You're in charge, but it's not free. "

" I'm the most democratic fascist you'll ever meet. I listen to everybody, and then I make a decision. "

" You can go see ballet in its purity; you can go to a recital to hear music by itself. But what the American musical does so thrillingly is bastardize these forms into something that is exhilarating and compelling and deeply moving. "

George C. Wolfe

American

You

" I love Kabuki, Noh theater and bunraku. "

" 1985 - That was my time in New York, and I have such poetic, fond memories. "

" You've got to make the rehearsal room very safe. You can't bully people, because if you bully people, they're going to freeze and lock up. "

" The wonderful thing about theater is that it has so many people involved in the creation of it. The worst thing about theater is that it has so many people involved in the creation of it. That dynamic is thrilling and challenging every time you make a show. "

" I absolutely love working on musicals, but anytime I finish a project, I want to move on to something completely different. "

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

" 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.' "

" I think all creative people are operating from the fear that, of the best of what they did, will anybody remember it? Will anybody tell stories about them? Will anybody keep those pictures on the mantle long after they are gone? It's why people write stories. It's peoples' grave markers. "

" I think we all have a primal desire to know as much as we can to find out about where we come from. "

" I'm perpetually interested by living in places as an artist confronting challenges I've never confronted before and approaching them with as much craft and humanity as I can. "

" The world doesn't see a lot of gray. The world sees black and white, and then it understands. "

" 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. "

" I want to create a theater that looks, feels, and smells like America. "

George C. Wolfe

Create

America