Billy Wilder Quotes

Don't be too clever for an audience. Make it obvious. Make the subtleties obvious also.

It's not very hard to be clever. It's far harder to be simple, obvious, and meaningful.

Simplicity should not be identified with bareness.

I'm an enemy of exposition. I feel there's no need to overstate.

It pays to be obvious, especially if you have a reputation for subtlety.

Because I write very simply, but inside the simplicity, there's a lot of subtlety. That's what I'm proud of.

Simple goes a long way.

The best things - when I really feel that I'm communicating, and when I really feel that people are getting it - are simple, straightforward recipes. I think simple is the hardest to achieve because you don't have all those elements to hide behind.

I want to be transparent, so I don't leave room for too much thinking.

It seems to me that invisibility is the required provision of elegance. Elegance ceases to exist when it is noticed.

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.

One of my favorite colors is no color at all.

I never want to confuse people or go over their heads.

I've always liked simplicity.

Sometimes, I find that just the simplest, cleanest things that are intelligently performed are funniest to me.

Elegance is innate. It has nothing to do with being well dressed. Elegance is refusal.

In character, in manner, in style, in all things, the supreme excellence is simplicity.

It is what it is, and it ain't nothin' else... Everything is clearly, openly, plainly delivered.

In saying what is obvious, never choose cunning. Yelling works better.

Extreme complication is contrary to art.

It is far more difficult to be simple than to be complicated; far more difficult to sacrifice skill and easy execution in the proper place, than to expand both indiscriminately.

Elegance is elimination.

I continue to be drawn to clarity and simplicity. 'Less is more' remains my mantra.

Elegance is refusal.