Director's Life Quotes

Being the son of a filmmaker, you are aware of a career as a director. You don't think of it as just movies, but as a life.

I don't think a director should have any kids. I don't even think it's good for your physical health. Even guys in their 30s look exhausted because directors never get enough sleep. What I do is stressful enough.

I think, when you're a director, you get sucked into your project whether you like it or not, right?

I get to be in a room with other actors, but I never, or very rarely, get the chance to be in a room with another director.

I kind of romanticized what it was like to be a writer and director when I was in my early twenties. Working as a production assistant knocked that right out of me.

It's kind of interesting to be a director who is all of a sudden being an actor playing an agent. This is my whole world!

I'm doing my best. I read in the paper that I'm an action director. They always say that, "Action director Walter Hill", if they bother writing about me at all. I think that's fine. I'm happy to do the work.

Directing is monumentally complicated and it's a function of all the time you pay to it. I think it would be great to do a movie I'm not in, I could just eat Fritos and just say, 'yeah, it's good!' Some day.

What surprised me about directing is how much I loved it and how happy I am to be on the set. I love coming to work in the morning. What I realized is that I never loved acting. I don't love being in the hair and makeup chair. I don't [love] being in costume. To me the strangest thing is that I've just spent the majority of my life in one aspect of this business, and because I was fortunate enough to become successful I never questioned whether I felt at home and found out later in life that I'm much happier directing.

I recognize the amount of time that it takes as a director. I made the choice to stop taking roles outside of L.A. because I didn't want to miss any of my child's life.

I mean... directing is a holy, unpleasant experience, to be perfectly honest.

It's awful to be married to a director! He's always busy, and his jobs last for 18 months. Right now Len's shooting Live Free or Die Hard. He works from 5 A.M. until 11 P.M. I tell him, "If you had told me what it was going to be like when we met, I never would have gotten involved with you!"

I don't want to say I'm never going to direct again, but directing's hard work.

I would direct TV. That's a little different. It's more of a contained world as a director. When you're doing a film you get on the rollercoaster, you put the safety bar down and then you're gone. And it's hard. It's hard, too, as a parent, I think, because the hours are so long. It's hard.

I like to be able to understand the feeling of the director, that a film corresponds to something in his life. Otherwise, it doesn't interest me much.

As a director you have to live and breathe that one story for 8 months completely. I like variety, if I write extensively I get a writer's block so I do something else to beat the boredom and then get back to something I've already done.

My dad always said there's four phases in an actor/director's life. There's 'Mario Who?' There's 'Get me Mario!' 'Get me a young Mario,' and 'Mario Who?'