Joseph L. Mankiewicz Quotes

• The difference between life and the movies is that a script has to make sense, and life doesn't.

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz

  Life, Differences, Scripts

  53 Copy quote

• Funny business, a woman's career: the things you drop on the way up the ladder so you can move faster. You forget you'll need them again when you get back to being a woman. It's one career all females have in common, whether we like it or not: being a woman. Sooner or later, we've got to work at it, no matter how many other careers we've had or wanted.

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz

  Moving, Careers, Female

  Gary Carey, Joseph L. Mankiewicz (1972). “More about All about Eve”

  19 Copy quote

• There is no such thing as realistic dialogue. If you [simply recorded] the real conversation of any people and played it back from the stage, it would be impossible to listen to. It would be redundant . . . . The good dialogue writer is the one who can give you the impression of real speech.

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz

  Real, People, Giving

  18 Copy quote

• Every screenwriter worthy of the name has already directed his film when he has written his script.

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz

  Names, Scripts, Film

  "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

  8 Copy quote

• So many people know me.
  I wish I did.
  I wish someone would tell me about me.

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz

  People, Wish, Know Me

  Gary Carey, Joseph L. Mankiewicz (1972). “More about All about Eve”

  9 Copy quote

• I've been in on the beginning, the rise, peak, collapse and end of the talking picture.

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz

  Talking, Ends, Collapse

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz, Brian Dauth (2008). “Joseph L. Mankiewicz: Interviews”, p.160, Univ. Press of Mississippi

  8 Copy quote

• I'm not biting my fingernails.
  I'm biting my knuckles.
  I finished the fingernails months ago.

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz

  Knuckles, Biting, Months

  4 Copy quote

• All playwrights should be dead for three hundred years.

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz

  Years, Three, Hundred

  "Fictional character: Margo". "All About Eve", www.imdb.com. 1950.

  6 Copy quote

• I am a critic - as essential to the theatre as ants to a picnic.

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz

  Theatre, Essentials, Picnics

  7 Copy quote

• [Writers are] the highest paid secretaries in the world.

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz

  World, Paid, Secretary

  4 Copy quote

• I got a job at Metro and went in to see Louis Mayer, who told me he wanted me to be a producer. I said I wanted to write and direct. He said, "No, you have to produce first, you have to crawl before you can walk." Which is as good a definition of producing as I ever heard.

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz

  Jobs, Writing, Definitions

  "Halliwell's Who's Who in the Movies". Book by Leslie Halliwell, Harper Collins, p. 312, 2003.

  4 Copy quote

• Please don't look at me as if you had a source of income other than your salary.

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz

  Money, Class, Salary

  6 Copy quote

• In my last two years in high school, my face was pocked with pimples, I stammered when I spoke; if I made a mistake, I blushed furiously, and when nervous, as I was in the company of girls, I perspired freely.

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz

  Life, Success, Girl

  4 Copy quote

• And Kate Hepburn-God, she's beautiful, God, she plays golf well, God, she can get anyone in the world on the phone, God, she knows what to do all the time, God, she wears clothes well.

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz

  Beautiful, Golf, Phones

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz, Brian Dauth (2008). “Joseph L. Mankiewicz: Interviews”, p.162, Univ. Press of Mississippi

  4 Copy quote

• There's nothing as real as money.

  Joseph L. Mankiewicz

  Real

  4 Copy quote

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