Zawe Ashton Quotes

As a producer you have creative control, and that's what is so exciting about it. At the end of the day, if you have made a film it's totally your responsibility, and if it works it's your responsibility and if it doesn't it's also your responsibility.

One of the best things about directing movies, as opposed to merely writing them, is that there's no confusion about who's to blame: you are.

When a director is also a writer, everyone on the production looks to him, knowing he gave birth to the idea. There's a different level of viability.

I guess when you're holding the creative reins, you can be across everything, and it's more authentic. You can control it.

For me to be able to punch above my weight creatively, to actually take a stand for what I was doing, I had to take on everything. I had to be the person who says, 'I wrote it. I directed it.'

If you write, produce and direct, you own things and see them through to the end.

I do like the idea of being an auteur in the sense of writing and being in your own stuff.

As an actor, your focus is very finite. All you're worried about is your character and what you have to do, what your goals are in this scene and in this piece of material. Whereas, as the director, everything is your responsibility. I enjoy carrying the load like that and being the responsible party.

I prefer to believe it's my responsibility if a film of mine works or doesn't work.

When you're writing, in theory, everybody is serving you. When you're directing, you're serving everybody - in the guise of acting like everybody's serving you. But you're really serving the materials. You're serving the actors. You're in charge, but it's not free.

Nothing else is as fulfilling as playing a part in which you are able to have a significant say in the creative process all the way through. How many actors get to do that? It's extremely rare.

The director is the ultimate creative arbiter of what's going to happen. And as a director myself, you really appreciate collaborating with people who are trying to help you find what you need and what you want.

I feel I should defer to the writers and the directors because they're the ones who have the complete vision. They see things through from the beginning to the end. I'm responsible for one small part, so my scope is much more limited than theirs.

I love being a writer-director. I couldn't imagine directing without writing it. You have to write and tell your stories - that's what directing is to me.

I discovered early in my movie work that a movie is never any better than the stupidest man connected with it. There are times when this distinction may be given to the writer or director. Most often it belongs to the producer.

I never, ever want to apologize for a film. If it's bad I'll say it's my fault. And that's what I can say so far in all the films that I've done, that if you don't like it, it's entirely my fault.

Working on 'Downton Abbey' is amazing, but there's an ensemble cast of between 18 and 21 actors. With 'Love Life,' there are two couples and a few other key characters. As a smaller unit, you've got to take more responsibility - at the same time, you can have more ownership of the direction it's going in.

It doesn't really feel like it's got anything to do with me. I mean, I know I wrote it, and all that and invented the characters and made it up, but it's Mike's film, so doing the press and stuff, it feels a little bit inauthentic. I was just one component of it.

When I read 'The Water Diviner,' I was having the same kind of visceral reaction that I would normally have acting in something. I believed that I was the only person that could tell this story the way it needed to be told. That's the real arrogance of a director!

Whether it's writing a monologue or writing standup or writing a screenplay or writing a play, I think staying involved in the creation of your own work empowers you in a way, even if you don't ever do it. It gives you a sense of ownership and a sense of purpose, which I think as an actor is really important.

I have been very lucky to have final cut in all my films; everything that is wrong in them is my fault.

I've never worked for a show or was on a show where I didn't have a lot of control creatively, but then again, I haven't worked on a lot of shows.

Paul's the writer. Yeah, I wrote a little of that stuff, but that's just technically true. In spirit, and in essence of the truth, it doesn't matter. So I don't know, maybe I'm being foolish for not being technical. Yeah, I wrote a certain portion of the things.

It's really hard as a screenwriter, you feel like you have a vision and then you turn it over to a director and you have to let it go.

I've had some success at writing and directing, and I like it. It's infinitely more creative than just acting, and I have things I want to say and do.