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I think if I've worked anything through with screenwriting it's that I'm not going to be able to work anything through.

Charlie Kaufman

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Charlie Kaufman
Age: 66
Born: 1958
Born: November 1
Film Director
Film Producer
Screenwriter
Writer
New York City
New York
Think
Thinking
Worked
Anything
Able
Going
Work

More quotes by Charlie Kaufman

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I tend to not only read reviews, but also every little stupid thing online. It's a very bad idea, and there's a lot of angry people in the world. And it's weird to absorb all that weirdness.
Charlie Kaufman
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People ask me all the time, What are your influences? Are you trying to do Beckett? It's like, No, I'm trying to do me. Whatever that is. I don't know what that is, but that's the basis. I'm trying to be true and I'm trying to be honest.
Charlie Kaufman
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I actually think I'm probably more interested in structure than most people who write screenplays, because I think about it.
Charlie Kaufman
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I think if something resonates, even if it's surreal, it's because it is relatable and I think that that's a core issue for me.
Charlie Kaufman
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I'm in my mind a lot. I live there.
Charlie Kaufman
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Before you start production, you have characters you have created without actors in mind, then all of a sudden you've got actors. They bring an enormous amount in creating these characters, and creating the dynamics between the characters that you've written.
Charlie Kaufman
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When you approach middle age, lots of stuff happens. Your body is aging, you're watching people around you get sick, you're watching people die, your mortality becomes very present at that point in your life.
Charlie Kaufman
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I studied acting at Boston University. I was in the theater department there. Somewhere in there I decided that wasn't what I was going to do and I went to the B.F.A. film program at N.Y.U.
Charlie Kaufman
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I'm not working on anything. I was trying to write something new . . . I guess the goal for me now, at least at this point, is to try to direct again.
Charlie Kaufman
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I think I've had pretty good experiences for the most part with the people who have directed my screenplays.
Charlie Kaufman
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There are nearly thirteen million people in the world. None of those people is an extra. They're all the leads of their own stories. They have to be given their due.
Charlie Kaufman
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I do a lot of things intuitively. I'm not often consciously aware of what I'm doing. It's like in a dream: There's something going on that's powerful but you don't know exactly why.
Charlie Kaufman
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There really is only one ending to any story. Human life ends in death. Until then, it keeps going and gets complicated and there's loss. Everything involves loss every relationship ends in one way or another.
Charlie Kaufman
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I have a tendency to hire people who tend to be unattractive to the studios. Maybe this is a bad idea.
Charlie Kaufman
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Do not simplify. Do not worry about failure. Failure is a badge of honour. It means you risked failure.
Charlie Kaufman
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I feel like I want to keep moving toward idiosyncracy. Personal, personal, personal.
Charlie Kaufman
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Story ideas, but it's also musing on stuff that I'm thinking about. This leads me to this and this leads me to this. They're kind of random and haphazard. Often I can't find anything. Somehow, by doing that, even though I don't necessarily refer to them in a specific way, I have some sort of architecture in my head.
Charlie Kaufman
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If you create something that is asking for people to respond as they're going to respond, you have to allow them to respond as they're going to respond. Some of the people are going to be uninterested and some people are going to be mad for some reason, which is their business. That's just the way the world is.
Charlie Kaufman
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I often have a theme in mind when I'm starting. I know that I want everything to be in a world of, say, evolution, or guilt.
Charlie Kaufman
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I'm not a celebrity. I'm intentionally and defiantly not a celebrity. I don't have any interest in it. I don't have any talent for it. I keep my personal life out of my public life as cleanly as I can.
Charlie Kaufman