The ‘Players’ – the big execs:
(a) “I have had a number of unbelievably painful moments with Hollywood executives, and the truth is that their reasons for rejecting projects were beyond ludicrous – they were willful and capricious, and in several cases meant that the scripts involved, which I had worked hard on and which…were wonderful, were never made. Not only were they unwilling to make them, but they were unwilling to put them into turnaround so that somebody else could make them.”
(b) “I had one producer with his own source of funding… He said, ‘I will write you a check for $30 million, you go make your movie.’ He literally had his pen poised. And he said, ‘But there’s one string attached. You can’t have this ending. You’ve gotta have another ending.’ And I said, ‘What ending would you like me to have?’ He said, ‘I don’t know.’ I said, ‘I don’t know either. This is the ending I’ve been thinkin’ about for twenty years now… this is the ending that makes intuitive, creative sense to me… If you have an alternative to suggest, by all means suggest away.’… He didn’t have that. So I said, ‘Thank you very much,’ I shook his hand, I walked out of his office without the $30 million check…”
(c) “I know this producer who never says, ‘Leave my office,’ but he sends signals when the meeting is over. Some people in the room don’t get the signal. They don’t pick up on that, and they wanna be friends. I’m friends with him because I picked up on his signals. You have to know how to read the people you’re with. It’s like a dance. You have to know who your partner is, and you have so many partners… But when it’s time to switch partners, you can’t get nostalgic.”
Excerpted: quotes (a) Nora Ephron & (b) Frank Darabont & (c) Antwone Fisher
Tales from the Script (2010)
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the watch of time 
Memorable Quotes: Tales of Screenwriters – Part Sixteen
The ‘Players’ – the big execs:
(a) “I have had a number of unbelievably painful moments with Hollywood executives, and the truth is that their reasons for rejecting projects were beyond ludicrous – they were willful and capricious, and in several cases meant that the scripts involved, which I had worked hard on and which…were wonderful, were never made. Not only were they unwilling to make them, but they were unwilling to put them into turnaround so that somebody else could make them.”
(b) “I had one producer with his own source of funding… He said, ‘I will write you a check for $30 million, you go make your movie.’ He literally had his pen poised. And he said, ‘But there’s one string attached. You can’t have this ending. You’ve gotta have another ending.’ And I said, ‘What ending would you like me to have?’ He said, ‘I don’t know.’ I said, ‘I don’t know either. This is the ending I’ve been thinkin’ about for twenty years now… this is the ending that makes intuitive, creative sense to me… If you have an alternative to suggest, by all means suggest away.’… He didn’t have that. So I said, ‘Thank you very much,’ I shook his hand, I walked out of his office without the $30 million check…”
(c) “I know this producer who never says, ‘Leave my office,’ but he sends signals when the meeting is over. Some people in the room don’t get the signal. They don’t pick up on that, and they wanna be friends. I’m friends with him because I picked up on his signals. You have to know how to read the people you’re with. It’s like a dance. You have to know who your partner is, and you have so many partners… But when it’s time to switch partners, you can’t get nostalgic.”
Excerpted: quotes (a) Nora Ephron & (b) Frank Darabont & (c) Antwone Fisher
Tales from the Script (2010)
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Memorable Quotes #24