When people say they write for themselves, that's probably what they do. I will admit that I don't write for myself; I write to be read. I've got the reader in my mind all the time.
If the stuff you're writing is not for yourself, it won't work.
An actor shouldn't have to leave the set and go home and write a bunch of stuff for a bunch of other people, the next day. I found it very unpleasant.
If you want to write for yourself, get a diary. If you want to write for your friends, get a blog. If you want to write for others...become an author.
To be honest I'd just love to keep writing hits for other people... That's kind of my secret dream.
For me, as a writer, I desperately want to be read. I'm very conscious of readers as I'm writing. I think, 'If you write for yourself, then why don't you just keep it under the bed,' so I definitely write for other people.
It's way easier to write for other people. Yourself isn't in it. When you write for yourself, you overthink, and you become paranoid. When you write for others, it isn't about you.
Writing screenplays is not my business. I've written half a dozen, and maybe half of those were made. But it was never a satisfying experience. It was just work. You're an employee. You would be told what to do. Studio execs would cross out my dialogue and put in their dialogue.
Whenever you write for someone else, you're always aware - sometimes overtly, other times at an almost cellular, subliminal level - of the rules about what you can and can't do.
I think writing and singing go together, but I treat them as two separate careers because I write for others. If I'm writing for myself, I prefer to be with the producer. And then we can vibe out and throw ideas back and forth, and I'll basically let the producer play me a bunch of beats until I vibe with one.
Everybody wants to feel that you're writing to a certain demographic because that's good business, but I've never done that ... I tried to write stories that would interest me. I'd say, what would I like to read?... I don't think you can do your best work if you're writing for somebody else, because you never know what that somebody else really thinks or wants.
I'd love to write for other people.
I just want to try writing for other people 'cause it's quite exciting.
When I wrote for myself before as an artist, I probably wrote about 15, 20 songs a year. I thought that was a lot. Then, when I first started writing for the people, I wrote, like, 65 songs in a year for two years in a row.
I never tried to write for other people. I liked people who had problems I might have, because we all have insecurities, regrets. I like heroes who were not 100-percent perfect, who things to take care of.
When you're writing on someone else's show, you don't have to think as hard about nailing the perfect tone because you're kind of just like, 'Here's 20 ideas I thought of, and they can just pick the closest.'
When you're a writer, your song has to resonate with the person you're writing for in order for them to want to sing it. But if you're an artist, you can sing whatever you want.
If it pleases you and you can write at all, it's gonna please somebody else.
I have never written for an audience. On the other hand I do not write merely to please myself.
I enjoy writing but I wouldn't want to do it all the time because generally you are not writing about things you want to write about.
I like writing for other people. I love it. It's great because you write it and then you hand it off to someone else. But in terms of directing, anything I direct will be something I've written or re-written. I'm in no crazy rush to direct.
Writing for others is great cos you can tailor it for them.
I feel very creatively satisfied and lucky that I get to write for other people, but for something I direct, it has to be something I completely understand every facet of.
I don't even use italics or boldface; that's clutter, not clarity. Fancy fonts are fine for blogs, just as calligraphy is fine for diaries. But when you're writing for anyone other than yourself, you want to get as universal as possible.
My husband and I had the opportunity to write some stuff for other people. We both tried it. I think it lasted about two weeks, and we both felt ridiculous. It just didn't work for us.
