Lloyd Kaufman Quotes

On an independent film you're lucky if you get one, but ostensibly the job is the same. There's very little difference, apart from the knowledge that there's a captive audience at the end of it - which you can't always guarantee with a movie.

If I'd gotten the job I wanted at Montgomery Ward, I suppose I would never have left Illinois.

I decided to be a filmmaker between my sophomore and junior years at Morehouse. Before I left for the summer of 1977, my advisor told me I really had to declare a major when I came back, because I'd used all my electives in my first two years. I went back to New York and I couldn't find a job. There were none to be had. And that previous Christmas someone gave me a Super-8 camera, so I just started to shoot stuff.

I never really considered acting as a career until I moved to New York.

As an actor, there are places you can live, and when I graduated from school, it was either New York or L.A., and I liked the East Coast. That's why I ended up in New York.

I'm not going to head off and do a Marvel film. So if I don't do a Marvel film, I don't have any other choice - I've got to go make a small New Zealand movie!

I don't think I'm going to change jobs at this point.

My plan was to go to New York and do some theatre, and then I got the script for 'Psych.' I was like, 'Ahh - just as I thought I was out, you pulled me back in!' I had a great meeting with the show creator and we laid out the parameters to make the show work: what I would do, what he would let me do.

I got an offer at 'Vogue.' And I desperately wanted to work in magazines. My interest wasn't in fashion, but when you get an offer right out of college for a magazine that big - I decided that it was probably better to start at a big name magazine, even if I wasn't necessarily fascinated with the subject.

I will tell you that I'm a bit of a snob. I love film, and I would like to work in film, and I'm disappointed that indie film is as hard as it is to work in now. It's hard to get things done, but that sort of work is being done on TV. That's what I do; that's what I write. It's what I love, and hopefully, that's what my future's going to be.

It wasn't until 2013 that I even started working in film. It was always something I wanted to do from six, but I didn't know how to get there other than working really hard and going to New York and doing theater like I saw on the bios of some of my favorite actors.

I went to Europe in '52 or '53, and when I came back, I stopped in New York. I remember looking out of a window on a glorious October morning and there was New York. And I thought, 'I'm coming here. This is for me.'

I was in a very lucky position to be able to consider studio films and had decided to not go that route for a very long time until I read a script that I loved called 'Aeon Flux.'

It was never a conscious decision to stay away from Telugu cinema.

When I was in New York I heard many people saying that the independent film industry was in big trouble. I was reflecting on this when I came home. Realizing that ever since I started filmmaking, people have being saying that. But somehow it keeps going. Filmmakers keep going. We need stories to make sense of the world and some people like me are driven to tell them. I have faith this will always be possible.

Gian Luigi Polidoro and his girlfriend had written this script, it was an American comedy, and they decided I was the guy to play the part. I was young, they offered me the lead in the film, and I said, "Sure, I'll do it." And I'm telling you, there is a movie waiting to be made about the making of a movie like that, particularly at that time in New York. I mean, we shot all over the streets of New York without permits. We would literally grab a shot and run. But Rent Control... I think the total cost was $100,000, and to this director's credit, I think it looks like $200,000.

I've done a lot of independent film, which are short shoots that are usually four to six weeks, max. I enjoy everything. After one particular experience of work, I like to go in the opposite direction and do a short film, or something else.

I went to the Independent Spirit Awards and won.

I mean, I made The Phantom, although The Phantom was, believe it or not, an independent film. It was just a very large, expensive independent film.

When I was the first time for a job in New York, I saw Natalia Vodianova on an oversized billboard in Times Square on a Calvin Klein billboard.

It's my first sort of commercial attempt, but it made sense for me because I'm not that kind of guy and I'm not going to continue to do that kind of movie.

In the States it's more and more difficult to get an independent film off the ground, and you certainly wont get the opportunity to play something like that in a studio movie.

Independent film is such a huge deal in the UK. There aren't many big budget studio movies that get greenlit at all. The indie film industy is a great opportunity that I'm trying to seize.

If people go to IMDB, they will see that I'm very comfortable with independent cinema, and doing studio films too. For me this is not an either/or situation.

When the doors to television were opened to me, that was quite a surprise. It's been such a gift that there was so much TV and independent film happening in New York that I could be a part of. There was something to satiate my desire to be artistic and creative, especially when it wasn't in the way I originally thought it was going to be.