Greta Gerwig Quotes & Sayings

I didn't know the city at all, but I was so happy to be in New York I cried. I was so excited. — Greta Gerwig

Using the energy in a scene can really cut the fat off of something and streamline it. It can make it work for you and activate it for you in a way. — Greta Gerwig

I'm not really capable of memorizing stuff without moving around, that's how I do it. — Greta Gerwig

There are a million little things, but one of the best ways to get to know characters is to just put them in situations and see what they say. — Greta Gerwig

I think any break-up from a long relationship has this accompanying feeling of who am I without this person. You feel like a half-person because you've integrated yourself into an idea of a couple for so long, and then teasing that out and finding out who you are without them, it just takes a while. It feels like an amputation. — Greta Gerwig

When I did plays in high school and college, I never remember memorizing my lines, but once I had blocking, I had all my lines memorized. Once I had movement associated with words, it was fine. Before I had blocking, it was just text on a page. Once it became embodied, it was much easier. — Greta Gerwig

I've never had a plan, I've always done things from instinct. — Greta Gerwig

The economy is rough. I think that affects everyone from big filmmakers to tiny filmmakers. — Greta Gerwig

I like movies about women behaving badly, because women behave badly just like men, and we're not always adorable and cute about it. — Greta Gerwig

I think it's really hard to work in a city where you live too, because I get so absorbed with the movie that I become a bad friend and a bad participant in my own life. — Greta Gerwig

Let your characters talk to each other and do things. Spend time with them - they'll tell you who they are and what they're up to. — Greta Gerwig

I feel like most people aren't either/or, they're both/and. You're both magnanimous and petty. You're both kind and cruel. You're never just one thing. — Greta Gerwig

I'm just a relationship girl. I fall in love and I usually have long relationships. I like getting to know people well and having substantive, long relationships. — Greta Gerwig

I love shooting in New York because I love the city. Ultimately, I like doing it there and the city is important to the story, but it can be hard to shoot where you live too because it is so all-absorbing. — Greta Gerwig

You don't need love and sex in films — Greta Gerwig

I'm not someone who's an immigrant who's struggling in that way, but between New York and L.A., I had someone tell me very early on, "If you're going to be broke anywhere, it's better to be broke in L.A. At least the weather is nice." I was like, "You're right." I didn't take them up on that. — Greta Gerwig

When I felt like I was looking down the barrel of nothing on the horizon it was hard for me. — Greta Gerwig

If you're with one person, then you don't have to meet other people. It's like when you're acting in a movie, you don't have to audition for other movies. I prefer that. — Greta Gerwig

You feel sadness for time passing. New York is a city that keeps reinventing itself, and I love it so much. — Greta Gerwig

Noah Baumbach does more takes than any director I've ever worked with. He runs a very quiet set and he runs a very hard working set. He has such an intense level of dedication to what's happening that he cultivates a group of people around him who have an equal level of dedication. Nobody asks, "When is lunch?" That's just not part of our sets. It's complete immersion. He has a 'no cell phone' rule. Nobody checks their cell phone. Nobody reads on set. It's like, "If you're there, you're there. If you're not on board with that, don't work on this movie." — Greta Gerwig

It feels like when I write, it's intuitive. This is true of Frances, and it's true of this [The Funniest Movie Of The Summer]. — Greta Gerwig

Sometime female characters, especially in the genre of something that people consider rom-com, make mistakes in a cute way or they're a mess in a way that's palatable. I like that. — Greta Gerwig

I think as an actress, I prefer having a character on the page. It allows you to be more invested in actually creating a whole person. It's easier when you're not trying to come up with your next line on the spot. — Greta Gerwig

I love just seeing shots of New York inside of a fictional movie that are not controlled. I do not like shots with extras, I have to say. I don't mind extras in other scenes, but I love New York City streets just as they look. I don't even care if someone looks at the camera. It doesn't bother me. — Greta Gerwig

I don't do well when I don't work. — Greta Gerwig

I'm not saying that everyone needs to be celibate, but you don't need a romance to complete a story about a woman — Greta Gerwig

In college, it's very easy to maintain your female friendships because you're in such close proximity all the time. — Greta Gerwig

Getting bad reviews or doing something that's not great is also really good for you as an actor. It also makes me feel as an actor that I've earned my stripes a bit. — Greta Gerwig

There's an economy in sports that I always think is a useful metaphor for acting. You have an objective. You're trying to win, and of course, you want to do well. You want to use good techniques so you enforce it, but also you don't do things you don't have to do. It's very economical, and I think that in acting the most economical way through a scene is always the best. It's active. There is the sense of the fight and you want to win. — Greta Gerwig

I was a ballet dancer. I did other kinds of dance but ballet was my great love. But then it became clear, when I was 12, that my body wasn't going to be right. That's always a heartbreaking moment because there's nothing you can do about that. Your body is just not right. You don't have enough turnout. You're not built properly. — Greta Gerwig

I was serious about ballet for a long time, but my mom got me into tap and jazz and modern and hip-hop, and I was one of those over-lessoned children. — Greta Gerwig

I like things that look like mistakes. — Greta Gerwig

I think in theater the playwright is king. Those words are unchangeable. They are the reason that everything else flows from. — Greta Gerwig

Movies are now more often watched on the small screen anyway. But at least for me, what got lost in that is the difference in the medium. — Greta Gerwig

It's so hard for people to give up their cell phones or their ideas of being connected to everything all the time in order to get an immersive experience. That's the best way to make art. It's almost like you have to treat it like you're going into a submarine, and Noah Baumbach totally agrees with that. There's not a real other life that happens outside of the movie while it's being shot, which I like. — Greta Gerwig

You keep learning how to let go and to live the life that you actually have, as opposed to the life you thought you were going to have. — Greta Gerwig

I can say I'm a relationship person, and I like relationships. I think I also like relationships because then you don't have to date because dating is horrible. — Greta Gerwig

In relationships, you learn a million things. I'm sure a therapist can tell you about it. — Greta Gerwig

I like people who love books and movies and art and want to talk about it all the time, because that's basically what I want to talk about. Intellectuals that are funny. — Greta Gerwig

I like acting and things when I like the writing. If I don't like the writing, I don't like acting. I think in some ways everything starts for me from the place of writing. — Greta Gerwig

We would go down to Riverside, California, which is very poor now, but that's where my grandfather grew up. He grew up during the Depression in Riverside. — Greta Gerwig

I love New York, but it's a rough city. It's not dangerous now the way it was in the 70's or the 80's, but it's still a rough city. It's hard to hack it there. Life is harder than it is on the West Coast. To be able to deal with that, you have to have a lot of aspirational feelings pinned on being there. — Greta Gerwig

I had dreams, but I didn't have the sense that they would necessarily work out. They seemed very far-fetched. — Greta Gerwig

I live in New York, and I love New York as well, but I think Los Angeles is a place where if you have the right person with you, there are all these little worlds that you would never guess by just looking at the exterior of what the city is. — Greta Gerwig