Elia Kazan

“To be a good director, you have to be a bastard.”

“The hardest thing about being a director is that you have to be right all the time.”

“All my life, I have been a worrier, a brooder. I am a man of gloom.”

“I believe that the only way that you can be a well-known director is to have a lot of talent and a lot of luck.”

“You’ve got to get the audience rooting for the guy you’re punishing.”

“I don't think I am a great director. But I am a good director.”

“What's a director? A director is a man who is a little bit of a writer, a little bit of an actor, a little bit of an editor, a little bit of a musician.”

“I was a good father, but I was a terrible husband.”

“There is a corruption in this country, a moral corruption, that is absolutely shameless.”

“The essence of the best art is that it is personal.”

“Whatever is gentle and timid in this world gets trampled on.”

“Directing is a terrible, lonely job. It's like being a lighthouse keeper.”

“Life is a goddamned, treacherous thing.”

“I like my villains to be as attractive as my heroes.”

“The essence of acting is the capacity to believe in the reality of what you're doing.”