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People ask me, 'What do you do?' And I tell them I'm a writer, but always with the silent reservation, 'I am, of course, not really a writer. Hemingway was a writer.'

David Mamet

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David Mamet
Age: 76
Born: 1947
Born: November 30
Actor
Author
Film Director
Film Producer
Novelist
Playwright
Poet
Screenwriter
Television Producer
Theatrical Director
Writer
Chicago
Illinois
David Alen Mamet
David Alan Mamet
Course
Asks
Tell
Reservation
Really
Hemingway
Always
Reservations
People
Silent
Writer
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More quotes by David Mamet

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We live in oppressive times. We have, as a nation, become our own thought police but instead of calling the process by which we limit our expression of dissent and wonder ‘censorship,’ we call it ‘concern for commercial viability.
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You can't rely on the acting to tell the story.
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Don't write stage directions. If it is not apparent what the character is trying to accomplish by saying the line, tell us how the character said it or whether or not she moved to the couch isn't going to aid the case.
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I tend to write a lot, which I think is the secret to being prolific.
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Old age and treachery will always beat youth and exuberance.
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My alma mater is the Chicago Public Library.
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I didn't knowingly meet a conservative until, to my shame, I was 60 years old and sat down and said, 'Wow, I don't understand what this guy's talking about, but he has a great civility about him. Perhaps I better investigate this thing.'
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You don't know what life is. You know nothing.
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It is not the constitutional prerogative of the Government to determine needs.
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I grew up in a tough neighborhood and we used to say you can get further with a kind word and a gun than just a kind word.
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Any time two characters are talking about a third, the scene is a crock of s***.
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Every fear hides a wish.
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I'm entitled to my political opinions, and I get to vote because I'm an American.
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Movies were never an art form, they were entertainment. It just evolved into an art form from there, and it's still evolving in different ways.
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I understand that computers, which I once believed to be but a hermaphrodite typewriter-cum-filing cabinet, offer the cyber literate increased ability to communicate. I do not think this is altogether a bad thing, however it may appear on the surface.
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My tendency as an actor was to correct people, was to say, 'What if we tried it this way, what about if we tried that way?' That's terrible habit for an actor, but that's a good habit for director. So I became a director.
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Life in the movie business is like the beginning of a new love affair: it's full of surprises, and you're constantly getting f***ed.
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We respond to a drama to that extent to which it corresponds to our dream life.
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Like Lincoln said: If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong, and I feel the same way about the leftist dismantling of the West. If that's not wrong, then nothing is wrong.
David Mamet
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Many players will not improve because they cannot bear self-knowledge.
David Mamet