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Marilyn was mean. Terribly mean. The meanest woman I have ever met around this town. I have never met anybody as mean as Marilyn Monroe or as utterly fabulous on the screen.

Billy Wilder

I have ten commandments. The first nine are, thou shalt not bore. The tenth is, thou shalt have right of final cut.
BILLY WILDER

Cutting Finals Nine
I don’t go to church. Kneeling bags my nylons.
BILLY WILDER

Church Nylon Religion
If there’s anything I hate more than not being taken seriously, it’s being taken too seriously.
BILLY WILDER

Hate Seriously Taken
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
Develop a clean line of action for your leading character
BILLY WILDER

Action Character Lines
I, you know, am all over the place – every category of pictures I have made, good, bad or indifferent.
BILLY WILDER

Bored Category Moved People
Money makes even bastards legitimate.
BILLY WILDER

Bastard Legitimate Make Money
After so many drive-in waitresses becoming movie stars, there has been this real drought, when along come class; somebody who actually went to school, can spell, maybe even plays the piano.
BILLY WILDER

Class Girl Real Somebody Stars
I met a lot of hard-boiled eggs in my life, but you – you’re twenty minutes.
BILLY WILDER

Eggs Funny Twenties
A director must be a policeman, a midwife, a psychoanalyst, a sycophant and a bastard.
BILLY WILDER

Directing Directors Film Sycophants
[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
The best director is the one you don’t see.
BILLY WILDER

Directors Inspirational Motivational
Hollywood didn’t kill Marilyn Monroe, it’s the Marilyn Monroes who are killing Hollywood.
BILLY WILDER

Country Hollywood Killing People
My Aunt Minnie would always be punctual and never hold up production, but who would pay to see my Aunt Minnie?
BILLY WILDER

Aunt Hold Pay Punctuation
My English is a mixture between Arnold Schwarzenegger and Archbishop Tutu.
BILLY WILDER

English Mixtures Schwarzenegger
The Austrians are brilliant people. They made the world believe that Hitler was a German and Beethoven an Austrian.
BILLY WILDER

Believe People World
I am big. It’s the pictures that got small.
BILLY WILDER

Great Year Hollywood Films Movie
Jerry: Oh, you don’t understand, Osgood! Ehhhh… I’m a man. Osgood: Well, nobody’s perfect.
BILLY WILDER

Men Perfect Wells
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
We are on the track of something absolutely mediocre.
BILLY WILDER

Mediocre Track Undoubtedly
Eighty percent of a picture is writing, the other twenty percent is the execution, such as having the camera on the right spot and being able to afford to have good actors in all parts.
BILLY WILDER

Able Actors Camera Writing
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 bad play folds and is forgotten, but in pictures we don’t bury our dead. When you think it’s out of your system, your daughter sees it on television and says, My father is an idiot.
BILLY WILDER

Daughter Father Thinking
You have to have a dream so you can get up in the morning.
BILLY WILDER

Dream Good Inspiration Morning
They’ve tried to manufacture other Marilyn Monroes and they will undoubtedly keep trying. But it won’t work. She was an original.
BILLY WILDER

Keep Manufacture Original Trying
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 just made pictures I would’ve liked to see.
BILLY WILDER

Like Made Picture

Marilyn was mean. Terribly mean. The meanest woman I have ever met around this town. I have never met anybody as mean as Marilyn Monroe or as utterly fabulous on the screen.

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Popular Authors

Marilyn was mean. Terribly mean. The meanest woman I have ever met around this town. I have never met anybody as mean as Marilyn Monroe or as utterly fabulous on the screen.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Billy Wilder Quotes