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A director must be a policeman, a midwife, a psychoanalyst, a sycophant and a bastard.

Billy Wilder

Now, what is it which makes a scene interesting? If you see a man coming through a doorway, it means nothing. If you see him coming through a window – that is at once interesting.
BILLY WILDER

Interesting Mean Men
Happiness is working with Jack Lemmon.
BILLY WILDER

Country Happiness People Work
Hindsight is always twenty-twenty.
BILLY WILDER

Funny History Luck
France is a place where the money falls apart in your hands but you can’t tear the toilet paper.
BILLY WILDER

Fall Money Paper Travel
A director must be a policeman, a midwife, a psychoanalyst, a sycophant and a bastard.
BILLY WILDER

Directing Directors Film Sycophants
You have to have a dream so you can get up in the morning.
BILLY WILDER

Dream Good Inspiration Morning
I never overestimate the audience, nor do I underestimate them. I just have a very rational idea as to who we’re dealing with, and that we’re not making a picture for Harvard Law School.
BILLY WILDER

Class Deal Law School Underestimate
An actor entering through the door, you’ve got nothing. But if he enters through the window, you’ve got a situation.
BILLY WILDER

Actors Doors Entering Situation
I have never met anyone as utterly mean as Marilyn Monroe. Nor as utterly fabulous on the screen, and that includes Garbo.
BILLY WILDER

Anyone Fabulous Screen Utterly
If you don’t like what you’re doing, it’s unlikely anyone else will either, so be sure you are happy with your own work first.
BILLY WILDER

First Firsts Own Unlikely
I had one life. And what did I do? Wasted it in some palooka preliminaries in Spain, just before Hitler and Chamberlain warm up for the main event.
BILLY WILDER

Chamberlain Events Preliminaries Spain
I don’t go to church. Kneeling bags my nylons.
BILLY WILDER

Church Nylon Religion
Ah, Marilyn, Hollywood’s Joan of Arc, our Ultimate Sacrificial Lamb. Well, let me tell you, she was mean, terribly mean. The meanest woman I have ever known in this town.
BILLY WILDER

Fabulous Mean Towns
The more subtle and elegant you are in hiding your plot points, the better you are as a writer.
BILLY WILDER

Hiding Plot Subtle
[about the Hotel Marmont on Sunset Blvd., a piece of Hollywood history] I would rather sleep in a bathroom than in another hotel.
BILLY WILDER

Bathroom Hotel Sleep Sunset
We’re making a picture for middle-class people, the people that you see on the subway, or the people that you see in a restaurant. Just normal people.
BILLY WILDER

Class Middle Normal People Restaurant

A director must be a policeman, a midwife, a psychoanalyst, a sycophant and a bastard.

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A director must be a policeman, a midwife, a psychoanalyst, a sycophant and a bastard.

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