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I do not dwell on dreams I know how soon a dream becomes an expectation How can I have expectations? Look at me, No, Captain, Look at me, Look at me!

Stephen Sondheim

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Stephen Sondheim
Age: 94
Born: 1930
Born: March 22
Author
Composer
Dramaturge
Librettist
Lyricist
Musician
Poet
Screenwriter
Songwriter
New York City
New York
Stephen Joshua Sondheim
Look
Captains
Looks
Expectation
Dwell
Expectations
Soon
Dreams
Becomes
Dream
Captain

More quotes by Stephen Sondheim

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I get some flak for and some resistance from colleagues for because I'm interested in storytelling. I mean what I like about songwriting is songs used to tell a story.
Stephen Sondheim
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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.
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For anyone approaching any one of the cast albums, if they don't like what they hear, it's not the performer's fault.
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All the best performers bring to their role something more, something different than what the author put on paper. That's what makes theatre live. That's why it persists.
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Ah, but if you have no expectations, You can never have a disappointment.
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Pointillism takes emotional images, character, etc., and makes them all come together and make a whole that tells a story.
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Nowadays, there are sometimes more producers than there are people in the cast, because it takes that much money to put a show on.
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When you know your cast well and their strengths and weaknesses, you can start writing for them, just the way Shakespeare wrote for his actors.
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I've always liked puzzles, since I was a kid. I like party games, silly games. I loved chess. I enjoy jigsaw puzzles, but I'm not particularly visual.
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Take a play that you like but you think is flawed, and see if you can improve it and turn it into a musical. [...] Then make up your own story.
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A song is such a short form ... that 'the slightest flaw seems like a mountain.' And so every song needs to be revised 'til it's close to perfection... But achieving perfection takes a lot of energy.
Stephen Sondheim
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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.
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Into the woods--you have to grope, But that's the way you learn to cope. Into the woods to find there's hope Of getting through the journey.
Stephen Sondheim
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By the time I get through writing a score, I know the book better than the book writer does, because I've examined every word, and questioned the book writer on every word.
Stephen Sondheim
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Everyone I used to play with has either given up or is dead.
Stephen Sondheim
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You move just a finger, say the slightest word, something's bound to linger-be heard.
Stephen Sondheim
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Every writer I've ever spoken to feels fraudulent in some way or other.
Stephen Sondheim
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Bit by bit, putting it together... Piece by piece, only way to make a work of art. Every moment makes a contribution, Every little detail plays a part. Having just the vision's no solution, Everything depends on execution, Putting it together, that's what counts.
Stephen Sondheim
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Oh if life were made of moments Even now and then a bad one--! But if life were only moments, Then you'd never know you had one.
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Over a period of time it's been driven home to me that I'm not going to be the most popular writer in the world, so I'm always happy when anything in any way is accepted.
Stephen Sondheim