Quotes from Stephen Sondheim

Theres a hole in the world like a great black pit and its filled with people who are filled with shit

I know what my decision is...Which is not to decide.

We committed the unpardonable crime of being mavericks who were successful.

Burn your bridges, start again. You should burn them every now and then Or you'll never grow!

I'm before him on my knees, and he kisses me He assumes I lose my reason and I do. Men are stupid, men are vain, Love's disgusting, love's insane, A humiliating business-oh how true.

You get used to the exact amount of space between lines. You write a word and then you write an alternate word over it. You want enough room so you can read it, so the lines can't be too close.

In not-for-profit theater, you don't worry so much about how the audience is going to react. You want to make them absorb the piece.

I took piano lessons when I was 6. I didn't want to go on with it. I don't remember being moved by a piece of music.

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

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

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.

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.'

Work is what you do for others, liebchen. Art is what you do for yourself.

The movie adaptations of stage musicals that I've seen, without exception, in my opinion don't work. A lot of people would disagree with me.

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.

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.

I'm very opinionated about movie musicals when they're adapted from live shows. You'll sit still for a three-minute song in a theater. But in movies, a glance from someone's eyes will tell you the whole story in a few seconds.

My parents got divorced and military school gave me a structure. A lot of kids my age were children of divorced parents. They didn't know what to do with the kids.

Just remember, Someone is on your side (our side) Someone else is not While we're seeing our side Maybe we forgot: they are not alone. No one is alone.

The truth is that I don't like rehearsals. I get embarrassed hearing my own work. I assume that the cast is embarrassed to sing the stuff.

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?

After the Rodgers and Hammerstein revolution, songs became part of the story, as opposed to just entertainments in between comedy scenes.

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

Art is craft, not inspiration.