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Creativity is not a talent. It is a way of operating.

John Cleese

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John Cleese
Age: 85
Born: 1939
Born: October 27
Actor
Autobiographer
Comedian
Film Actor
Film Director
Film Producer
Screenwriter
Stage Actor
Television Actor
Voice Actor
Writer
Weston-super-Mare
Somerset
John Marwood Cleese
Operating
Creativity
Talent
Writing
Way

More quotes by John Cleese

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I find it rather easy to portray a businessman. Being bland, rather cruel and incompetent comes naturally to me.
John Cleese
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The main evolutionary significance of humor is that it gets us from the closed mode to the open mode quicker than anything else.
John Cleese
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Political correctness is a bit like a granny, a maiden aunt arriving at a party when everyone's having a good time. And she comes in, they all start sort of buttoning up and becoming self-conscious and behaving properly and then when she leaves, you can have fun again.
John Cleese
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God was treated like this powerful, erratic, rather punitive father who has to be pacified and praised. You know, flattered.
John Cleese
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The sad thing about true stupidity is that you can do absolutely nothing about it.
John Cleese
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This is the extraordinary thing about creativity: If just you keep your mind resting against the subject in a friendly but persistent way, sooner or later you will get a reward from your unconscious.
John Cleese
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If you are leaping a ravine, the moment of takeoff is a bad time for considering alternative strategies... Do it in the 'closed' mode. But the moment the action is over, try to return to the 'open' mode... because in that mode we are the most aware, most receptive, most creative, and therefore at our most intelligent.
John Cleese
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I have a tendency sometimes to get too logical with what I'm writing, just because I want it to be kind of perfect.
John Cleese
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Basil Fawlty was an easy character for me. For some reason, portraying a mean, uptight, incompetent bully comes naturally to me.
John Cleese
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I have several times made a poor choice by avoiding a necessary confrontation.
John Cleese
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There are 3 basic differences between we British and you Americans. One, we speak English, and you don't. Two, when we have a World Championship, we invite teams from other nations. Three, when you meet the British head of State, you only have to get down on one knee.
John Cleese
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I get bored easily. I've been bored most of my life.
John Cleese
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Who's ever going to write a film in which I get the girl? Me!
John Cleese
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Some actors, I think, want to feel that they are as creative as the writer. And the answer is, frankly, they're not.
John Cleese
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As Daniel Levitin writes, our brain is a giant pattern detector. If we read something that coincides with what we already believe we're more likely to give it credence, while the opposite is not true.
John Cleese
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When people quote sketches to me, half the time I don't know what they're talking about so I have to sort of go, aha, yes, oh yep, I remember that and lie my way out of it.
John Cleese
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No hope for planet at all. But I will be gone before the planet is gone, so it's your problem.
John Cleese
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By watching the great, old comedians I picked up a few tricks about how to do physical comedy. And whenever I could learn something, I sort of added that to my repertoire.
John Cleese
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Muslims, who have a completely different value system, come to the West, then they should accept that there are certain basic values in the West intrinsic to our culture. Just as I wouldn't suggest that any Westerner walk down the streets of Saudi Arabia in a bikini.
John Cleese
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If I can get you to laugh with me, you like me better, which makes you open to my ideas
John Cleese