Celebrities
Oliver Stone Quotes: The Filmmaker’s Most Memorable Statements
On writing ‘Scarface’
“<a href=”http://articles.latimes.com/1989-12-17/entertainment/ca-1635_1_oliver-stone” target=”_hplink”>I was doing a lot of coke at that time</a>. I understood the meglomania, the delight, the paranoia of cocaine. I was near the top of the film business and nearly blew it away. ‘Scarface’ was my farewell to coke. ‘Salvador’ was my comeback from the abyss.”
On George H. W. Bush
“<a href=”http://articles.latimes.com/1989-12-17/entertainment/ca-1635_1_oliver-stone/2″ target=”_hplink”>The vandals are at the gate</a>. We have a fascist security state running this country . . . Orwell did happen. But it’s so subtle that no one noticed. If I were George Bush, I’d shoot myself. Existentially, there’s no hope. His soul is dead.”
On hard drugs
“<a href=”http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/oliver-stone-drugs-obama-savages-336423″ target=”_hplink”>Cocaine, I stay away from</a>. But I believe in LSD, mescaline, mushrooms, ayahuasca. You ever heard of ayahuasca? It’s a very strong juice that comes from the rubber trees. Ecstasy is great, too.”
On working with Tom Cruise in ‘Born on the Fourth of July’
“Just as ‘Platoon’ sucked something out of [Charlie] Sheen, it will be hard for Tom [Cruise] to go back to being innocent again. He’ll always carry around [his character] Kovic. No matter what Laurence Olivier led us to believe, he won’t be able to put it in a closet like an old costume.”
On Hitler
“<a href=”http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/celebritynews/6962475/Oliver-Stone-suggests-Hitler-is-easy-scapegoat.html” target=”_hplink”>Hitler is an easy scapegoat</a> throughout history and it’s been used cheaply. He’s the product of a series of actions. It’s cause and effect.”
On being crazy
“<a href=”http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/oliver-stone-savages-336458″ target=”_hplink”>I was crazy for many years</a>. So is everybody, you know. But now, I’m pretty sane. There’s been so much craziness in my life — and there still is — but it gets out through the work.”
On Jewish domination of the media
“<a href=”http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/07/26/oliver-stone-jewish-domin_n_659795.html” target=”_hplink”>Hitler did far more damage to the Russians</a> than [to] the Jewish people, 25 or 30 [million killed]…[no one knows this because] the Jewish domination of the media. There’s a major lobby in the United States. They are hard workers. They stay on top of every comment, the most powerful lobby in Washington. Israel has f****d up United States foreign policy for years.”
On his Jewish media quote being taken out of context
“But, unfortunately, my comments were blown up into this storm. It hurt me deeply, because I’m not that way. I’m not a provocateur.”
On director’s cuts
“<a href=”http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20041121/PEOPLE/411210301″ target=”_hplink”>I don’t believe in this business of chopping up a film</a> and then releasing a ‘director’s cut’ on DVD. What you see should be the director’s cut. This is the director’s cut. If you can spend four hours killing Bill, Alexander deserves some space.”
On everyday struggles
“<a href=”http://www.esquire.com/features/what-ive-learned/ESQ1104-NOV_WIL” target=”_hplink”>I’m not a great man</a>. I’m a fuckin’ man like you, struggling through the goddamn day.”
On marijuana
“<a href=”http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/oliver-stone-drugs-obama-savages-336423″ target=”_hplink”>I believe the grass is God’s gift</a>. California makes the best in the world now. When I was a kid, it was Vietnamese, it was Thai, Jamaican for a while. All my life I’ve been doing it, off and on. I can stop marijuana. I can [go without it] for weeks and weeks. I’m not addicted, but I enjoy it. I also enjoy alcohol.”
On moms
“<a href=”http://www.esquire.com/features/what-ive-learned/ESQ1104-NOV_WIL” target=”_hplink”>All of men’s problems</a> stem from their mothers. The mother is so important.”
On spirituality
“<a href=”http://www.salon.com/2010/09/23/oliver_stone_interview_by_mzs/” target=”_hplink”>I’ve always felt, if you look back at my work, that there is a spiritual side</a>. Even going back to “Platoon” — there were mystical concepts in it. I’ve always felt materialism has its limits. That feeling has only deepened with time, frankly. It hasn’t changed, it’s deepened, the awareness that money is so tricky, what money can do to people.”
On Richard Nixon
“He was a man. He lived a life in the arena, sometimes right, sometimes wrong. You have to put flesh on the man. Liberals from the ’60s still hate him; it’s a badge of honor. They won’t lose their anger. Maybe they feel their suit of armor will fall off, or they’ll lose their identity. It’s time to move beyond that ideology and look at what he was and what he did, especially now with the legislation coming from the Republicans. A lot of them are Nixon clones. … If you had never known about him, and you saw the funeral on TV, you would have thought he was a great national hero like Winston Churchill or something. What happened at the funeral is typical of television. Nixon dies and suddenly he’s a great patriarch and statesman.”
On the New York Times
“<a href=”http://www.salon.com/2010/09/23/oliver_stone_interview_by_mzs/” target=”_hplink”>The New York Times, I respect it</a>. They try very hard, they’re good people, a good newspaper. But they have certain blind spots. One of them was the JFK assassination. They didn’t cover it. They didn’t do any real uncovering. They never have. Never reviewed one book positively, other than the Oswald-did-it-alone scenario.”
On working in Hollywood
“If you work in Hollywood, you have to get past the studio development committees. The thousands of demands. The previews where they dumb it down for the audience. The system wears you down. It’s a monster — demanding, uncompromising. Marty Scorsese and Spike Lee have been through hell …”
On the state of our country
“<a href=”http://www.salon.com/2010/09/23/oliver_stone_interview_by_mzs/” target=”_hplink”>The mismanagement of the country</a> is enormous at this point and our policies are really askew. The white man will continue to intervene in foreign countries. The bigger issue is that after the Soviet Union fell, we just lost all control of ourselves, it seems. We can be the unilateral force in the world, the lone policeman.”
On the drug war
“<a href=”http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/savages-boss-oliver-stone-knows-good-weed-says-made-in-usa-pot-is-worlds-best/2012/07/05/gJQA6fPpPW_story.html” target=”_hplink”>It’s worse than slavery</a>, per capita. In the black community, it is a form of slavery, this drug war, because it imprisons a huge portion of people, destroys their lives, coarsens our culture. And why? Marijuana is much less harmful than tobacco and prescription drugs in many cases and certainly alcohol. This puritanical strain got started with Nixon. It was a political issue for him, and it’s gotten worse. It’s like the Pentagon. You can’t stop it.”
On why he’d never do a horror movie
“<a href=”http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2006/dec/15/guardianinterviewsatbfisouthbank” target=”_hplink”>It would be a disaster for me to do a horror film</a> — I’m not a natural born sadist, actually, and I think you have to be to do a good horror film. You have to scare the shit out of the audience, you have to really want to. I don’t know if I could.”
On working with Richard Dreyfuss
“<a href=”http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/oliver-stone-drugs-obama-savages-336423″ target=”_hplink”>That was probably the single worst experience I’ve ever had</a> with an actor in my life… I walked him outside, and I read him the Riot Act. I said, ‘You’re going to read these fucking cue cards, and if you don’t read them, this scene is over.’ So, yeah, I was a fascist.”
On paying attention to critics
“<a href=”http://www.avclub.com/articles/oliver-stone,52996/” target=”_hplink”>I do and I don’t</a>. They hurt. I’m not thick-skinned in that way. I certainly pay attention, and it does hurt if I allow it to.”
On what draws him to filming powerful subjects
“<a href=”http://www.avclub.com/articles/oliver-stone,52996/” target=”_hplink”>I’m not only interested in power, per se</a>. I’m interested, I suppose, in tortured power. [Laughs.] The tortured power of Richard Nixon and Alexander fascinate me.”
On being misunderstood
“<a href=”http://www.avclub.com/articles/oliver-stone,52996/” target=”_hplink”>I think a lot of people misunderstand</a> what I’m doing, because my films are not easy sometimes. They do deserve a second viewing. I think they get misunderstood easily.”
On exorcising his demons
“<a href=”http://articles.latimes.com/1989-12-17/entertainment/ca-1635_1_oliver-stone” target=”_hplink”>I’m puzzled by life, horrified by the daily newspaper</a>. The only sane response is re-creation, drama . . . an ordered series of events that arouse pity and terror, to paraphrase Aristotle. Making movies is my way of exorcising demons, of creating an ethos, a philosophy of life. I’d go crazy without fantasy.”
On Blake Lively
“<a href=”http://www.moviesonline.ca/2012/07/oliver-stone-interview-savages/” target=”_hplink”>She’s very elegant, sophisticated, and she has a concept of script</a>. She reminds me frankly of a very smart, like a Meryl Streep at that age. I knew her when she was starting out, kind of has that same, and she looks great, you know. If events are good to her, she could go all the way. She’s got the chops.”
On the future of film
“I think there’s a whole older generation that will go to movies still. People like me; people over 45. It just doesn’t play to the younger demographic. Yeah, they do go to opening weekend, but the fact that Liam Neeson can make two consecutive movies in a row that are fun, easy to watch, and commercial says something.
On economics
“<a href=”http://www.esquire.com/features/what-ive-learned/ESQ1104-NOV_WIL” target=”_hplink”>I don’t know if you’ve ever</a> read an economics book. They call it the dismal science for a good reason.”