Joe Johnston Quotes

In television you don't have a lot of time to spend with the role or the script. Typically you get a script a week prior to shooting. Sometimes it's even less time, not enough time to dream about the role.

But I'm very happy to work within tight parameters, and when you know you have an actor for two days, and you have to get that work done in two days, that focuses the mind wonderfully.

I had to do this very aggressive, big score in a very short time, and knowing that in the beginning, middle, and end would be this very, very famous theme, but I still had to weave a score around it and make it work as a score was really challenging.

One of the things that's, I think, hard in television is that there's a certain sameness to a lot of television because you're working in a very constricted box, and the box is defined by the amount of money you have to spend and the amount of time you have to get ready.

The biggest challenge was that we had to shoot so quickly and with such a limited budget.

Directing is a more pragmatic experience, where you have to deal with the restrictions of time and money that force you to make certain decisions you don't have to make when you're writing.

I think there's always great tension because there never seems to be enough - there is always pressure. There's always pressure because there isn't enough time. There's never enough time for a movie, it seems to me. Never.

The size of the budget doesn't make that much of a difference because the kind of issues I have on a low budget film I have on a big budget film as well, but they're just much bigger.

The size of the budget doesn't make that much of a difference because the kind of issues I have on a low budget film I I have on a big budget film as well, but they're just much bigger.

Compared to TV, 'Palookaville' was restriction-free, except we had no money and no time.

There was so much on 'Superstar' that we didn't intend. I mean, there were things that we did which were innovative, but some of them were forced on us because we couldn't get anybody to do the show. 'Evita' was much more sophisticated. That doesn't make it better, but it does make it different. We knew what we were doing.

All writers are forced to live within deadlines, and deadlines determine how good they can be.

Bigger-budgeted films have more restrictions and less freedom to create. Because of this, I try to find freedom in the people I work with. I often work in ways I don't want to. It's more about controlling the situation. Lower-budget films are freer.

With 'Gerald's Game' in particular, we didn't have enough money or time and it was really hard.

Sometimes you shoot for 40 or 50 hours for a one-hour show, and you have to make some very hard choices.

We can't take quarters, minutes, plays off.

I admit that I resent running out of research money.

I don't get to make many features. It's not like that's something I can just snap my fingers and make happen.

I give myself limits - not only financial limits, but I also limit my method of expression, and from within those limits, I try to come up with something new and interesting.

TV show is always challenging. It's challenging when you have all of the time and money in the world, and it's more challenging when you have less money.

Finances completely determine what we can do and how quickly we can move.

Movies are - all I've found is that they're just tougher and tougher to make.

I'm afraid of time... I mean, I'm afraid of not having enough time. Not enough time to understand people, how they really are, or to be understood myself. I'm afraid of the quick judgements or mistakes everybody makes. You can't fix them without time. I'm afraid of seeing snapshots, not movies.

We're all confounded by a lack of time.

As for a fashion designer, you have those very precise deadlines to keep so you have to renew yourself constantly every three or six months. When you think about it, it's so intense.