Quotes About Inspiration

When I did 'Bird,' it was a surprise to some people, first because I wasn't in it and second because most of the films I'd been doing were cop movies or westerns or adventure films, so to be doing one about Charlie Parker, who was a great influence on American music, was a great thrill for me.

When I was a little kid, my parents would show me Marx Brothers' films and westerns and stuff like that. That's where all my desire to be an actor comes from and probably most of my understanding of acting comes from for sure.

Mel Brooks is an interesting one because he started out making films about stuff that he was totally affectionate about, like musicals, westerns, horror films, Hitchcock films. And then, as they get further on, and you get to 'Spaceballs,' then it's just kind of contrived.

Sergio Leone was a big influence on me because of the spaghetti westerns.

I decided to write Westerns because there was a terrific market for Westerns in the '50s. There were a lot of pulp magazines, like 'Dime Western' and '10 Story Western' that were still being published. The better ones paid two cents a word. And I thought, 'I like Westerns.'

My mother was a reader; my father was a reader. Not anything particularly sophisticated. My mother read fat historical or romantic novels; my father liked to read Westerns, Zane Grey, that kind of stuff. Whatever they brought in, I read.

I'm a big fan of Clint Eastwood, but the Westerns I draw from most directly come from an earlier period in Hollywood. I actually look back at movies like 'Rio Bravo' and others I've liked over the years, and I capture pictures from the movies and use them as a reference for the scenes I create.

The impetus for 'The Sisters Brothers' was it occurred to me that there was no neurosis in westerns, or there's a minimal amount of it.

I haven't read a lot of Westerns. But I wrote a Western. The influences were all cinematic.

I do feel that I need to do at least one more Western - I think you need to make three Westerns to call yourself a Western director.

You don't get to make Westerns every day.

The Westerns have probably affected me more than any one thing, Western-related material. I love Westerns.

Even 'Bonanza' was derivative of other westerns and, of course, other westerns were derivative of 'Bonanza.'

I am inspired by both Japanese Samurai films, in particular the films of Kurosawa, and how they share the spirit of American Westerns, with the influences running in both directions, and including the 'Spaghetti Westerns' and films of Sam Peckinpah.

My drive comes from my parents and from Westminster.

Once in a blue moon, everything will be right with the man in the sky, and when I start singing 'I Love a Rainy Night,' from out of nowhere, there will be lightning and thunder. I just say, 'Folks, we've got the best special effects guy in the world, so let's get wet together.'

As far as characters are concerned, Alan Partridge makes me wet myself. I'm currently reading the book and have started talking like him as an unfortunate consequence.

A writer can write in an attic, or on top of a bus. Or with a sharp stick in some wet cement. To act, an actor has to have words. A stage. a camera turning.

When I was in junior high, a foreign-history teacher started a theater class. So I got my feet wet there and through high school, so I was very fascinated with acting as a means of expression.

I used to get stuck trying to find the first sentence of a story, then I realised that it was often because I didn't know what problem a character was facing in the story. As soon as I did, I could have the character trying to do something about it or have the problem whack him between the eyes.

The phone started ringing when I dropped 'Whack World.'

Once we start hitting lyrical themes that can whack you from all these different perspectives, we know we're onto something special.

I have these rhyme-based ideas because I love Julia Donaldson. 'The Snail and the Whale' is one of the most beautiful poems, and I feel like I could do that.

I wanted to do something creatively, having been a beached whale for many months and nursing my daughter.