Todd Phillips Quotes

If you get an impulse in a scene, no matter how wrong it seems, follow the impulse. It might be something and if it ain't - take two!

I love working with actors who will just go, 'Oh O.K., let's try it and see where it goes,' and 'Let's see what we can discover.'

To make great movies, there is an element of risk. You have to say, 'Well, I am going to make this film, and it is not really a sure thing.'

I just go with the flow, so any style can be in my music - that makes it exciting.

You never know what you do that could be totally out of left field, which actually might work and give something fresh to the whole scene, to the character, whatever. If you have that with a director who then knows how to shape it, either in the direction, in the moment, or in the editing, then that's good.

You know. I'll try anything. I'll do anything. I'll explore. Try different takes. All that kind of stuff to do sometimes, to do good performances, but always conducive to having a good time creatively.

I film quite a bit of footage, then edit. Changes before your eyes, things you can do and things you can't. My attitude is always 'let it keep rolling.'

I'm open to anything. I would love to play someone completely off the wall.

I've always done very 'composed' music and worked-out solos. But sometimes it's fun not knowing where you're going.

I really like to experiment. That's the only way I can work. It's instinctive.

A certain rough-around-the-edges improvisational looseness - a sense of something coming together before your eyes, or not quite - may be one of the things that distinguishes performance art from theater.

That's kind of like how jazz is sometimes. You're out there predicting the future, and no one believes you.

I free-form it, rock n' roll it. I'm a creature of risk, so I don't know how I'm going to explore a Beethoven symphony until I'm doing it.

You have to be very flexible and understand as a director, especially as a writer/director, that you cannot hang onto stuff really hard. You have to be ready to accept those happy accidents and to anticipate that they are going to happen and capitalize on them.

I don't have one role that I'm particularly fond of doing, and I don't really look for it to differ all the time, but I will try anything and do anything. If it's a role I connect with, I'll go for it, no matter what's involved.

The slightest thing can ruin a scene, but you must be willing to take chances.

With Fincher, you can take chances and try things. And what happens is that any pretension and preparation you've done, all the square, intellectual work, you can't keep that up for 40 takes. It breaks down, and new things start popping up. This, for me, is the most exciting thing about film-making.

I'm not a planner. I like to try something different, to just see what happens.

I find that the projects I enjoy signing up to at the moment are with a director who's interested in the script - isn't completely sure what the movie is and isn't concerned about it. He's just interested in going on the journey and discovering it.

It's great when improv is encouraged. It's a really fun thing. It depends on who's in the movie and how their process works as well. It takes a director who is open to that because you have a script, but then something funny could happen on set.

As I get more confident as a filmmaker, I don't need to prepare so much in advance. I can trust that I and my team can come up with a solution.

Every film that I make is an accident.

I'm trying all kinds of crazy stuff at house shows just for my own amusement and to see what the people are gonna do.

When I wrote 'Grand Illusion,' I was making it up as we went along. I wrote this stuff and tried to do the best job I could.

I've worked with directors who have done it too much, particularly in television, you know, 'okay we got it, let's move on, next setup.' 'Well what about, we could maybe investigate?' 'Mmm… no, let's go.'