Simon McBurney Quotes

That first writing session, what Dan Hill calls a creative blind date, is always a real challenge, and you bring that back to your partner when you return to writing with them.

People sort of imagine Chris Morris and me sitting somewhere dark, with dripping taps and chilling background music. In fact, we like to sit on his roof in the sunshine - and there's an endless amount of just sitting there, going, 'So, erm, er, what shall we do?'

I just love working with actors, and I love working with writers, working with designers. I feel that I am just a storyteller, and whether I am wearing the director hat or the playwright hat, it doesn't matter. And the rooms I tend to be in are pretty democratic, and the best idea wins.

I just want to stay creative, share my ideas and see where it all leads.

I hardly ever go into the studio with a work complete in my head. It emerges from communal activity.

Magicians are typically introverted; they don't tend to work with others, but I work with software programmers, composers, designers, so it's a very diverse group and the result is always more interesting than something I could have done by myself.

Basically, I see myself as a maker of things who knows how to support other makers of things. At the end of the day, I am just committed to helping put good stories out into the world in whatever role is appropriate and needed for that particular project.

But I'm blessed to work with great people. I collaborate with brilliant stylists both here and in Paris. I work with a great design team. I really allow everyone to bring their ideas. I almost rely on them to inspire me.

Whatever Kanye tells me, I just try to put it in my little machine and make the perfect solution for it. That's always our collab formula, and that's just how 'Gorgeous' came about.

It's fun and super exciting to see how other people work, how other people write music, and how other people put things together. To me, it's an endless learning process, and I love doing it because everybody works so completely differently.

I believe everything creative is somewhat collaborative. If you're a painter and someone stretches your canvas, it was collaborative on some level.

My career has gone in such a way that I've gotten to learn that, when you're working with a great storyteller, you don't ask questions; you just trust them.

Part of what I love about producing is to get to work with writers.

I think if you speak to any creative person, there's something so powerful - so intoxicating, if you will - about discovering another voice, another instrument, another way of looking at things, another way of perceiving things.

Working with artistic people is very special, especially when they are so professional.

I want to interact creatively with the directors I work with - it's a thrilling way to work.

Creator and reader are partners in the invisible creating something out of nothing, time and time again.

The writers are so smart, I can only imagine. I would love to be in that room. I love the creative process.

I like working with writer-directors because you can solve problems right there.

Any film, or to me any creative endeavour, no matter who you're working with, is, in many cases, a wonderful experience.

And 'Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll' was a very transitional film for me in that I was one of the producers and you know, came up with the idea with the writer and the producer, as well. But, it was a very collaborative event. You know, I really love working in that way.

I enjoyed so much working with the guys from Wilco, and riffing off of them, and having someone come up to me with ideas, because normally in the studio it's me who has to come up with all the ideas.

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.

God has given us an imagination, and our imagination is really the principle tool from which all creativity and artistry comes from.

When I'm a part of someone else's creative process, it's all about facilitating their ideas and hopefully bringing their perspective and making it a part of a song.