John Lloyd Young Quotes

Imitation always stinks. When I take photos, I don't go back. I don't look at the past. I'm always original.

You can't copy anybody and end with anything. If you copy, it means you're working without any real feeling.

Everything I record, I just try to sound like me and come up with songs that suit what I do, and then just go for it.

There were times in my career when I would try to write songs like Bob Dylan... Artists get hooked up in that. To be a follower, you lose.

What I've learned is that it's okay to take from heroes, such as Debussy, but it has to be filtered through my own personality so that ultimately it's me.

If you're always thinking about someone else's work, about the tradition you're working in, how can you possibly make anything good?

I have less than no interest in trying to replicate another brilliant actor's work, thank you very much.

You'd never play Hamlet if you started worrying about who's played it before you.

But at a certain point, you have to take your influence and find your own voice if you want to become a relevant artist.

When you put something out there into the world, there's all these words you don't want to hear, that you hope people don't say. I don't like anything that starts with 're' - like retro, reinvent, recreate - I hate that. It's always like living in the past - copying, emulating.

It's not like what I do or what I wear is my copyright. What I'm wearing now also is an inspiration. It is how I saw it on the mannequin, and I just wore it, so it's in a way copied. But obviously, I wouldn't want to spend my life thinking about dresses. It is such a waste of life.

In terms of my actual acting, I don't really like to to copy anyone or replicate anything that I've seen.

There is a very thin line dividing characterisation from impersonation. I've to make sure I don't cross over into mimicry.

I think you can study too much. I've seen that happen. Young people get immersed in the work of other directors and end up imitating them rather than finding their own identity.

If your entire conception of what's possible in fantasy only comes from other fantasy books, you're going to go on to create a copy of a copy of a copy. There's nothing original there, nothing dynamic. Which is fine if that's your goal, but I've always wanted to do something no one else was doing before.

As actors you have this trait to imitate very easily. I don't want to imitate anything or limit myself of finding this creature, this woman because I'm looking at magazines and I'm reading comics, and I'm asking people that are avid readers of The Guardians.

You can’t learn your craft by copying me or anyone else. I hope what I do can do is in some way inspire others but I would be appalled if I thought my work was being studied as ‘the right way to do the job’. My way is just one of an infinite number of ways to do the job.

To admire on principle is the only way to imitate without loss of originality.

Photographers who come up with power never get accused of imitating anyone else even though they photograph the same broom, same street, same portraits.

Go and see what others have produced, but never copy anything except nature. You would be trying to enter into a temperament that is not yours and nothing that you would do would have any character.

A man is entitled to draw things in his own style. I didn't hurt Superman. I made him powerful. I admire Superman, but I've got to do my own style.

If you think a man draws the type of hands that you want to draw, steal ‘em. Take those hands.

When I start writing a poem, I don't think about models or about what anybody else in the world has done.

Wow, I wish I could have done something like that.” That’s the thing, with other filmmakers, if I like them I just feel admiration. And yes, I usually say, “I wish I could have been part of that creative process,” because the films I admire like that are so specific that I know the creative process is also so specific, it’s nothing you could just imitate.

One of the reasons I love making movies is because it's an opportunity to share with the world a different way of being or a different way of living or seeing the world. If it's something you've already seen before, if I have too many reference points for it, then it's not exciting for me to make.