Michael Ian Black Quotes

People are more naturally protective of what they create than of what they consume.

I'm a very hands-on person; I don't just want to give my name to something and not be a big part of it.

All of the things I've directed, I'm really emotionally close to. That's why I choose to direct them and spend years on them.

I don't think I'm the best screenwriter in the world. It's just important to me to write my movies so I'm personally invested in them.

One of the things I've always tried to do is to inject myself as much as possible into the movie, so I feel like it's mine.

Your own creations are your own children; you gave life to them, so you'll always have, if not more passion to them, more connections to them.

There's not like a science to it, necessarily, but I'm also the kind of person who spends a long time in the studio. I will spend my entire advance just getting it done, which is probably stupid, but I don't have extravagant taste. I mean, I paid for it, so there you go. Why not? The recording process is also very fun.

I really put my heart and soul into everything and I don't want a project that doesn't feel real to me or I don't get invested in. In order to drive a show for eight or 10 years or whatever the target for doing a show is, it really has to be a part of you. Because then I can come up with stories for seasons and seasons on end. I wish I had the ability to just like the idea and get people in and drive it that way through their enthusiasm. For me, it has to be a little more of a personal thing, even if it's not a completely personal story.

To me, the producing falls into the same as acting. It requires so much time out of your life, and I take it very personally, I realize. So if I do something, it just has to be something I love and I don't want anyone else to do. When I open projects, maybe something will appeal to me. I think I'm not opening them because I don't want anything to appeal to me right now.

I can't imagine being invested in someone else's script.

If you get people to feel that they are putting something, that they are creating it and so on, their love for the project would increase. The more something is yours, the more you're willing to invest in it.

I don't want to make a 100 hundred million dollar movie I have no stake in.

Everyone will always have ideas about how to make your work better. Everyone has advice about how to end your play differently. Start it differently. And it's not about right or wrong. At the end of the day, it's your baby, and you know what's best.

I tend to get quite close to the songs because I've always been the main songwriter.

As the director, you have it in your mind how you want the part done, how you want someone to do it, and so sometimes you just say, 'Why don't I do it myself?' So for a little role, I'll just do it.

But professionally I've never felt as strongly about a project, with the exception of 'The Bridges of Madison County', as 'The Light in the Piazza'.

We've been fully involved in making our music, and to be personally involved is what we really asked for.

'Heirs' became an emotional experience for me. I had a hard time bringing out my emotions in the series. I used all my physical and emotional energy to bring out all that acting.

Whenever I've done jobs, whether it's an acting job or writing job, there's an aspect of it that feels like you help build your piece of it, and then you watch as someone takes it, and they finish building it.

I just didn't realize, being a young person, that if you sign up to make a film, a certain portion of your soul is forever gone. From there on, you are that character to everybody you'll ever meet again.

People don't realize what they have when they own a picture by me. Each picture is a phial with my blood. That is what has gone into it.

It's always nice to have people love the things that you do. But it's a lot of hard work, and people are always passionate, if it's family fare or a drama, it's the same amount of work and people invest everything into that, and when it doesn't come out the way you want it to, of course it's hurtful.

I don't claim anything of the work. It is his work. I am like a little pencil in his hand. That is all. He does the thinking. He does the writing. The pencil has nothing to do with it.

You don't just see and feel the movie, you see and feel every day you worked on it.

Directing takes a good chunk of your life out. It's a very hard thing. As an actor, you go in for a couple of months and do your job, and then you move onto another one. As a director, it's with you for quite some time and you're responsible for the entire thing, whether the results are good or bad, or whether people throw darts at you or put you on a pedestal.