Tom Perrotta Quotes

As a writer, you're really in control of almost everything. That's not the case in TV. You have to be prepared to work with a lot of people to make something happen, and you got to be prepared, at least in the beginning, to not be too good at your specific task.

One of the great things I learned from how cooperative theater is, you can't be too precious about your ideas.

In a way, editing is not unlike the movies. The best books, just like the best movies, are a collaboration. They're only as good as the compromise made between the artists involved.

Vince or Brad or Benicio would say, Maybe we should try this, and Guy was open to changes.

I believe you can work with anybody.

I'm just not a purist. You set goals and you have to work with everyone to figure out how to get what you can.

The filmmaking process is a team effort. A screenwriter cannot possibly do exactly what he wants as if he was writing a novel.

When I write a novel, I am God at my own typewriter, and there is nobody in between. But when I write a screenplay, it must be a compromise because there are so many elements which are outside the writer's province.

You can't start a movie by having the attitude that the script is finished, because if you think the script is finished, your movie is finished before the first day of shooting.

Toby not being there doesn't bother me, I mean I can work with anybody as long as we get along and as long as they've got an understanding of what I want and what I'm aiming for. To start with, when he left, it was difficult.

I know how to work with people. I've worked with the same people for 10 years. I'm not that kind of auteur. I hear ideas.

Pretty much, I am always open to input from everyone; although I don't require it, the feedback is conducive to getting the play together.

One thing I learned particularly at Yale was how to work with others. Having studied so long trying to master myself, the biggest challenge was learning about the other person's work.

I play well with everybody.

I would like to work with whoever would like to have me.

When you collaborate, you have to be willing to scrap a lot.

When a film works, the director had a lot to do with that, but the director also didn't have a lot to do with that. There are so many moving parts. It's really about being open to how the river is flowing and trying to get on the river.

I may see a way I want to do something, and I understand when you have a team, everybody can't do their own thing. I'm willing to put my own agenda aside to do what's best for the team.

There was a time in my career when my hackles would really get raised if someone came in and said, 'We need you to do this or that.' But the fact of the matter is, you're working in a shared universe, and all elements of the universe are, ideally, going to mesh and work together. That's my goal. I want to be on the team.

Every actor you work with has a different method, same with the director. You have to figure out what your shared language is and how to best support each other, and also take care of yourself.

I love to be the lead, but you can't always be the lead.

Filmmaking is a much more collaborative thing than literature, so you know you're going to be working with a group of people at the start. You know it's going to be a compromise.

A collaboration, you have to collaborate, meet in the middle, yield to the other collaborator, and that's a wonderful thing.

As to the differences between game work and novel writing, well, obviously the former is a lot less lonely - you're in and out of meetings all the time, bouncing stuff back and forth with the level designers, the art department, the animation team, so forth.

Every scene is on the table to collaborate on, to pick apart, to try a million different ways. Usually, what ends up occurring in the end is something that no single person knew would happen or had planned for.