Laura Benanti Quotes

I don't write women who are weak or simpering.

I think the role of the Bond woman has changed so much over the years that it now doesn't follow a typical archetypical view. Before, it was very much a beautiful woman who didn't contribute much and who usually ended up getting killed or was arm candy for Bond. But now the women in a Bond movie have so much more to offer.

There are so many female roles - particularly for young women - that are just somebody's girlfriend or somebody's daughter, or that are accessories to the main story rather than being three-dimensional characters.

The women I cast have to embody all sorts of contradictions... I have to find the right woman to speak to other women.

There seems to be great roles for women, and it's not necessarily - you don't have to be young women. Suddenly, we're realizing that, generally, women are interesting, and they can also be weird and crazy and mean.

I'd been so tired of 'strong female characters' for so long by then. I was so tired of the way female strength was made to look cold and humorless; the way it was characterized as deviant and 'unnatural' and always lonely and exceptional. I was tired of the grim undertone of tragedy that lurked under its surface. 'Strong female characters' were never funny, and they never had any fun, either. More often than not, they were celibate, friendless, and clinically depressed. Their monomaniacal devotion to crime fighting made them lean, cranky, and impatient. Naturally, they had axes to grind: they were avenging brides, poker-faced assassins, gloomy ninjas with commitment issues. Who were these characters? What were they trying to tell us? Why didn't they ever say goodbye before hanging up the phone? And why were they always being reborn or remade as killing machines after losing everything they held dear?

There are now superhero movies fronted by women, and I think directors generally are moving away from that stereotypical woman's role that is just about being flirted with by a man before falling into his arms.

I would love to do a chick flick sometime soon, a film with strong female characters - when I say strong, I don't mean that they are changing the world, but just be real women.

I like any film where the female characters are complex and have a functioning imperfection.

'Splendour' broke through to new territory for me. It exposed my commitment to writing for women: my desire to recognise that they can be as aggressive, violent, mercurial, and complex as men.

I have three daughters who grew up while I was working on the special editions and the prequels. They got to be big 'Star Wars' fans. And, you know, I would see them identifying with a lot of the male characters, and I just thought, 'Star Wars' could use more good strong female leads.'

There are very few shows that show women talking like strong, sassy women. Do you know what I mean? 'Sex and the City' started doing that, and that was why that was such a huge hit.

You know, right now, they say - I don't know who says this, but somebody told me - there's three male roles to every female role. And I guess I'd work on evening that up. Making great roles for women. It's just such a huge challenge.

We don't have enough young, female antiheroes. We don't accept women as antiheroes the way we do the men.

I'm drawn to female characters; not all of them are strong characters.

What I think is wonderful is that women are not just avengers or victims in films. They are people. They are characters. It's so refreshing. They're playing different kinds of characters, and they aren't being typecast.

Women are never the protagonists; we're always reactionary against everything that's done to us. I like people who write for women that have got a bit more about them.

I certainly relate to Ygritte in the fact that she is so strong and also ruthless as well and I feel that especially within 'Game of Thrones,' I think that as a show, it is one of the frontrunners for showing dominant female characters and making sure that men answer to women rather than the other way around.

I think that the audience wants to see women being put into real situations where they can relate to them, rather than seeing some glamorous woman in a 'Bond' film.

I think that Hollywood misconstrues actresses saying, 'Oh I wanna play a strong female character,' like we all want to play, like, superheroes or something.

I was of the generation where most of the Disney princesses and female characters were not girls that I admired. They just weren't characters I looked up to and identified with.

I've made movies that are real boy movies - but I've had so much fun over the years working with women and getting good performances with women and with strong female characters.

I think as women we've always been very used to growing up reading and identifying with male protagonists, especially in fantasy. There's a saying in publishing that girls will read about boys, but boys will only read about boys, and it's important to give women strong heroines.

I'm so sick of hearing how there's no strong roles for women. I don't care about strong roles. I just want to see women who are characters! A nun, a serial killer, a housewife, as long as there's some depth there.

I don't believe that a female character needs to surrender her femininity in order to be an action hero.