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That’s what I like about [smoking] . . . taking a drag off of death, Mmm! Gives me a sense of controlling my own destiny. What power! What exhilaration! Want a drag?

Beth Henley

I was just restless with being in school; so I went out to Los Angeles.
BETH HENLEY

Country Restless School
I love to work, although sometimes I can spend whole days doing nothing more than picking the lint off the carpet and talking to my mother on the phone.
BETH HENLEY

Mother Phones Talking
The next thing I wrote was in a writing class at night school. It was about a poor woman who worked at a dime store and who was all alone for Christmas in Laurel, Mississippi.
BETH HENLEY

Christmas School Writing
It was kind of enlightening to become a playwright.
BETH HENLEY

Enlightening Kind Playwright
But here’s the thing: what you do as a screenwriter is you sell your copyright. As a novelist, as a poet, as a playwright, you maintain your copyright.
BETH HENLEY

Copyright Novelists Poets
Part of that is that New York has proved to be too much fun for me to live and work; I love New York so much.
BETH HENLEY

Country Live Work
But when I got to SMU and decided to take a playwriting class, I said this isn’t a bad idea. IfI write characters, they could be as dumb as me, and I don’t have to be very smart.
BETH HENLEY

Character Smart Writing
It’s really interesting that whenever you do something that is so out of character, like having an emotional outburst, that you don’t get in trouble.
BETH HENLEY

Character Emotional Interesting
I grew up in Jackson, Mississippi, really in suburbia, so my mother was in community theatre plays.
BETH HENLEY

Community Mother Play Theatre
Somehow I got to be one of five or six actors that the directors would use as guinea pigs at this directing colloquium, where people pay to listen to and watch the directors direct.
BETH HENLEY

Director People Pigs
I just loved being divorced from my own wretchedness.
BETH HENLEY

Divorced Own Wretchedness
Plays are so much more special if they’ve never ever had a production, but I think you can really work on a play and make it better with each production.
BETH HENLEY

Play Special Thinking
There are probably brilliant people, geniuses, alive today who don’t even know how to say, “Hello, how do you do?” because their minds are absorbed with electronic images.
BETH HENLEY

Live Mind People Today
I did write a couple of original screenplays, but I’d rather write plays.
BETH HENLEY

Couple Play Writing
I’m very into the first production of the show.
BETH HENLEY

Firsts Production Show
I tried to start a theatre in LA and failed miserably, but I was probably not meant to raise money.
BETH HENLEY

Money Raise Theatre

That’s what I like about [smoking] . . . taking a drag off of death, Mmm! Gives me a sense of controlling my own destiny. What power! What exhilaration! Want a drag?

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That’s what I like about [smoking] . . . taking a drag off of death, Mmm! Gives me a sense of controlling my own destiny. What power! What exhilaration! Want a drag?

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Beth Henley Quotes