Terrence McNally
Terrence McNally
Terrence McNallyis an American playwright, librettist, and screenwriter...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPlaywright
Date of Birth3 November 1938
CitySt. Petersburg, FL
CountryUnited States of America
fodder money network supportive treated writers
'American Playhouse' is very supportive of writers. That's really why writers like to write for 'American Playhouse' for very little money. They care about making your play, your script, not some network production. We're treated like playwrights, not like fodder for some machine.
people
With me, writing is 60% imagination, 30% people you know and 10% you don't know where it comes from.
certainty community theater york
The New York theater community is a place I know my way around in with some certainty,
written
This play was written for these 11 actors just as 'Master Class' was written for Zoe Caldwell, or 'Frankie and Johnny' was written for Kathy Bates,
oppression spoke standing time
It was a time of oppression and you spoke up -- and we won. Without you, I wouldn't be standing up here either.
bow british northern setting
I said if they wanted to keep the British setting in Northern England, then I will bow out, because that's not my lingo.
mom people kind
Young people have got to start their own theaters, really. All good theater is a kind of mom-and-pop operation. Start your own theater.
writing play nervous
There are so many rules about play writing. I'd have a nervous breakdown if I followed them.
writing thinking people
Whenever you think you're writing what other people want to hear from you, and that it'll be commercial, you're doomed to disaster. Writing has to be as truthful and specific as we can make it. The minute we think that we're reaching more people and pleasing them, we get general. And audiences sense that and turn away, shun us.
callas
In those days, you had to like one or the other. You couldn't like Sutherland AND Callas.
writing play firsts
Work with good directors. Without them your play is doomed. At the time of my first play, I thought a good director was someone who liked my play. I was rudely awakened from that fantasy when he directed it as if he loathed it. . . . Work with good actors. A good actor hears the way you (and no one else) write. A good actor makes rewrites easy. A good actor tells you things about your play you didn't know.
surprise projects turns
I like to surprise myself. I've always been attracted to projects where I don't know how they're going to turn out.
core embrace passion quite trying turn understand
If you're trying to write something that you don't understand and embrace at the very core of you, it's not going to turn out with quite the authenticity and passion it should have.