Jonathan Levine Quotes

I was asked to do a reading of 'G.B.F.' and I loved the script. I thought it was one of the most amazing things I'd read, but it took a year to get a green light for production.

Since signing with Universal, I have been working closely with Gary Ross, the director, producer and screenwriter. We have spent many hours on the phone, and I've been sending him information and items that have been useful to the writing process.

I'm developing some screenplays at the moment with my Australian producer.

Since I began making movies, I've always looked for screenwriters instead of going through the long and painful process of writing.

A producer friend of mine from film school had read some of my early screenplays - some experiments I had done to see how fast I could write something.

Actors don't request what scenes to be written in. That's just not how it works.

I'm not saying I'm a writer, but I've been in movies for a long time, and I think I could write a script for a movie.

Before 'Twilight' was greenlit, I had four projects at four studios. I worked super-hard on all of them, but 'Twilight' was greenlit first.

I wasn't trained as a writer-director. And the projects I write are difficult to finish.

I love doing fiction. I love doing performance films and I love doing documentaries that don't have music. I love to shoot and I love to shoot things I'm enthusiastic about.

For me now, it's about what you would write and what you wouldn't write, and that's how I select what I am going to do. It can be quite nice being brought a concept by a studio for me to work on.

I want to work with anyone who's passionate about telling a story. I obviously have a list of people I really love, but it's a really long list.

I love making movies and hope to write my own screenplay someday and do some producing and be behind-the-scenes as well.

India needs better producers than screenwriters. No producer wants to invest in out-of-the way scripts.

I've never read a screenplay in advance. You trust the artist.

Everyone has an idea that they think would be a great movie. Everyone has a cousin who they think you should work with.

I have no interest whatsoever in pursuing acting or becoming a mogul. I love writing and directing; I see those two jobs as the most critical in the making of a film.

I love thinking of movie stars who could play the characters in the books I write.

There's one great script that hit my desk that I didn't change at all, and that was True Romance.

'Hardware' came about because I had written quite a few scripts and hadn't had any luck getting them made.

I wrote the screenplay for 'This Is Where I Leave You' - all 40 drafts of it.

I'm currently working on a romantic comedy between me and Philip Seymour Hoffman. So my next step is to write something so mind-blowingly spectacular that he has no other choice but to agree to do it! Wish me luck.

As soon as you make some films that people like, you'll be sent material, and that can come from anywhere.

You can sit around and complain that Hollywood doesn't make any good movies. But you can generate your own material. So I read books. I come up with ideas. I was the producer on 'The Woodsman' to help get that off the ground. Sometimes that extends itself to directing.

First hand on 'Go Goa Gone' I learnt how to write on final drafts, how the process works.