I'm just a Chicago actor who's a playwright. Even with the success of 'August,' the people in town who come to our theater know me by sight, because they've seen me onstage so much. Tracy Letts More Quotes by Tracy Letts More Quotes From Tracy Letts All women need makeup. Don't let anybody tell you different. The only woman who was pretty enough to go without makeup was Elizabeth Taylor and she wore a ton. Tracy Letts makeup different needs Thank God we can't tell the future. We'd never get out of bed. Tracy Letts bed thank-god You know, people see [August: Osage County], and I tell them that it's based on my family, and they assume that I came from some kind of horrible, hysterical circumstances. That's not true. My family, my nuclear family, was actually very close. My mom and dad were great parents and they encouraged a real rich, creative life for me and my brothers. My extended family, like every family, has some darkness, and some violence of some kind, emotional or otherwise, in their past. Tracy Letts dad mom brother I don't think I'd give advice. That never pays off. That's always a bad idea. If they follow your advice and it doesn't work out, or if they don't follow your advice, somehow you're on the hook for it. Tracy Letts work-out giving thinking If you're not entertaining, what the hell's the point? Tracy Letts entertaining hell ifs I don't know what it says about me that I have a greater affinity with the damaged. Probably nothing good. Tracy Letts affinity greater knows I mean there’s a certain finality about a movie, when it’s done it’s done – that raised eyebrow in that moment will always be that raised eyebrow. Whereas a play only lives as a blueprint for a performance on any given night. There’s a reason you can eat popcorn and watch a movie and you can’t do that in the theatre. Theatre you have to lean in, you have to tune your ear to the stage and participateI respond to heat. And blood. And humanity. The cold experience is not for me. I’ve always enjoyed all the real people in a room together in the theatre. Tracy Letts real night mean You get to know a character that you play on-stage in a pretty profound way over a length of time. I don't want to sound highfalutin and say you become the character, you just start bringing more and more of yourself to the part until the character and actor, it's hard to tell them apart. It's some weird amalgam. In film, because of the period of time, I don't know that you ever get that deep into it. Tracy Letts film character profound Well, one of the things we're supposed to be able to do as playwrights is write from a place of empathy, get into another character's shoes and experience things both mundane and tragic. And people don't - like me right now - people aren't necessarily the most eloquent when trying to express their emotions. I guess I feel as a playwright that those people deserve a voice, too, a voice that isn't so articulate that they themselves can no longer identify with it. Tracy Letts shoes writing character What they frequently want to do with a movie is, they want to cut out the valleys and just show the peaks. And valleys are important; the valleys make the peaks stand out. Tracy Letts valleys cutting important I'm aware that a film is different than a play, and that a film isn't going to be the filmed record of the play. It's its own separate entity, and I've come to peace with that. Tracy Letts records different play A certain giving up of control is good for the soul. Tracy Letts giving-up soul giving Women are beautiful when they're young, and not after. Men can still preserve their sex appeal well into old age.... Some men can maintain, if they embrace it ... cragginess, weary masculinity. Women just get old and fat and wrinkly. Tracy Letts women beautiful sex I said to my wife just the other day, I was actually taking some time to consider all the blessings in my life and that things are really good. I said, you would have to be a real churl to complain about the life I'm living right now. Everything's going great. I'm having a good time. Tracy Letts living-right real blessing The window shades have all been removed. Nighttime is now free to encroach. Tracy Letts nighttime shade window Divorce is an embarrassing public admission of defeat. Tracy Letts embarrassing divorce defeat Listen to me: die after me, all right? I don't care what else you do, where you go, how you screw up your life, just... survive. Outlive me, please. Tracy Letts please screw-ups care I never know what the hell I'm writing about, I never know what the next thing I'm writing about is, I never have a plan. Tracy Letts hell next writing My last refuge, my books: simple pleasures, like finding wild onions by the side of a road, or requited love. Tracy Letts onions simple book If you feel like you're in control of everything, and then things aren't going well, you feel like you're failing. Tracy Letts wells failing like-you
