Harold Prince famous quotes

A star may guarantee business, but the tradeoff is a very short run.
-- Harold Prince

#Running #Stars #Guarantees

It's nice to stay up nights worrying about the material, and not about the investors who gave you $10 million to do your musical.
-- Harold Prince

#Nice #Night #Worry

Most of the big money people don't know what would interest an audience if you did it. They only know what interested the audience last time.
-- Harold Prince

#People #Lasts #Bigs

Producers want to put their music behind revivals but I don't think that's a good trend for the theater at all.
-- Harold Prince

#Thinking #Trends #Want

The idea that I have to be on the same side of the fence as Dan Quayle is cruelly depressing to me, but the truth is, I believe in family values.
-- Harold Prince

#Depressing #Believe #Ideas

The musical has always been in jeopardy - until - or was in jeopardy until it was realised that it is probably the safest living theatre art form.
-- Harold Prince

#Art #Musical #Theatre

The truth is, for some absurd reason, no one is willing to admit that the interests of the producers and the theater owners are not the same.
-- Harold Prince

#Truth Is #Reason #Absurd

There are wonderful composers and librettists out there. It's the lack of creative producers that is troubling.
-- Harold Prince

#Creative #Wonderful #Composer

We've got to find a way to protect the process of making musical theater.
-- Harold Prince

#Musical #Way #Process

What's missing in the musical theater is producers willing to nurture new work, raise the money and put it on.
-- Harold Prince

#Missing #Musical #Theater

You think, 'Musicals, they must always be romantic' - You'd be surprised how few of them historically have ever been romantic.
-- Harold Prince

#Thinking

Artistic self-indulgence is the mark of an amateur. The temptation to make scenes, to appear late, to call in sick, not to meet deadlines, not to be organized, is at heart a sign of your own insecurity and at worst the sign of an amateur.
-- Harold Prince

#Heart #Self #Sick

I got successful awfully quick, and I wanted it... But I do think there is responsibility to move the musical theater form forward. I think you always have to be aware of the work that came before and build on that.
-- Harold Prince

#Moving #Responsibility #Successful

I like to do everything you can possibly do before you go into rehearsal, because once we are in rehearsal or on the stage there will be a problem I didn't anticipate. It's really good to think we got it all nailed - of course you've never got it all nailed.
-- Harold Prince

#Thinking #Rehearsal #Problem

I was there when the quote-unquote golden age of musical theater was flourishing. I met everybody who worked in theater or was famous in theater from the '40s on.
-- Harold Prince

#Musical #Age #Golden

I would like to see more new productions of new material by new composers/lyricists/book writers. I would like to see people take more chances. I think because everything costs so much they're not taking the chances they used to.
-- Harold Prince

#Book #Thinking #People

The idea is to work and to experiment. Some things will be creatively successful, some things will succeed at the box office, and some things will only - which is the biggest only - teach you things that see the future. And they're probably as valuable as any of your successes.
-- Harold Prince

#Successful #Ideas #Office

It's a terrible shame if you're born the brightest guy in your class. If you're not, then you have to hustle-and that's good.
-- Harold Prince

#Class #Guy #Intelligence

I've seen a lot of 'Show Boats,' but I've never seen the one that thoroughly satisfies me.
-- Harold Prince

#Boat #Shows

I've never been able to understand where great artists come from.
-- Harold Prince

#Artist #Able #Great Artist

Audiences are quite happy to be astonished, and they don't care who does that astonishing.
-- Harold Prince

#Doe #Care

Criticism is valuable... and self-congratulatory experiences are not.
-- Harold Prince

#Self #Criticism #Valuable

Despite the successes, you remember the failures - rather lovingly.
-- Harold Prince

#Remember

I always had a good time in theatre, even when shows don't turn out as well as I'd like.
-- Harold Prince

#Theatre #Good Times #Shows

I didn't go into the theater to be a producer, I went into the theater to be a director.
-- Harold Prince

#Directors #Theater #Producers

I don't like abrasion while I'm working. I don't thrive on chaos. I enjoy what I'm doing, and it seems to work better when I am enjoying it.
-- Harold Prince

#Chaos #Enjoy #Thrive

I don't look back. I look forward and plan new shows. That's really feeding the most important part of working in the theater.
-- Harold Prince

#Important #Looks #Feeding

I don't think there's a defined contemporary American musical, do you?
-- Harold Prince

#Thinking #Musical #Contemporary

I love big, bold, truthful theater - the tradition of Victorian theater.
-- Harold Prince

#Truthful #Tradition #Theater

I really don't spend time thinking about the past. I think about the future. I'm not stopping.
-- Harold Prince

#Past #Thinking #Stopping

I really wish people - maybe it's naive - wish people had priorities and were willing to be artistic patrons.
-- Harold Prince

#People #Priorities #Wish

I remember when people actually wore coats and ties to theatre every night. They don't anymore. It's very different.
-- Harold Prince

#Night #Ties #People

I saw 'On The Town' about nine times. I discovered it. I loved it. I was in college.
-- Harold Prince

#College #Nine #Saws

I was nine. I saw Orson Welles in 'Julius Caesar.' It was involving, emotional, imaginative. I've never forgotten it.
-- Harold Prince

#Emotional #Nine #Saws

I wouldn't want to be just pigeonholed as an extravagant director.
-- Harold Prince

#Directors #Want

I'm always glad to see somebody rethink something rather than reproduce something I did.
-- Harold Prince

#Glad

I'm crazy about Dublin. If you went back 3,000 years in my ancestry you wouldn't find a drop of Irish blood in the veins, but I love the place.
-- Harold Prince

#Crazy #Blood #Years

The perfect expression of receiving a lifetime award is to be working when they're handing it out.
-- Harold Prince

#Awards #Expression #Perfect