Lynda Obst Quotes & Sayings

In most fields of endeavor there are no easy jobs; there are only graceful ways of performing difficult ones. — Lynda Obst

My sense of Los Angeles was very New York provincial, as in 'all those people are crazy out there' (which they are), and stupid (which they're not), and immoral (it's more interesting than that). — Lynda Obst

Like the color black, business mixed with anything turns to business. — Lynda Obst

Ego problems are endemic in every walk of life, but in the movie business egomaniacs are megalomaniacs. — Lynda Obst

True power is invisible and impeccable, like good taste. It is never clumsy or artless. Powerful people whisper, suggest, seduce, in order to coerce. They only use volume for effect. This is how you can tell a blowhard from a mogul ... Most powerful people don't need to coerce; their mere presence is coercive. — Lynda Obst

Recognizing that the movie business was the entertainment business that wasn't moving fast enough to fill my creative and financial coffers was an impetus to grow, and that has taken me and so many of my colleagues into a larger world. — Lynda Obst

With all these tentpoles, franchises, reboots and sequels, is there still room for movies in the movie business? — Lynda Obst

When I was starting out, the first women studio heads and writers were just getting into their perches - development execs learning their chops. — Lynda Obst

Breakthroughs, in art, in culture, in personality, come when tackling the unexpected. — Lynda Obst

I think there are always actor parts, and then there are movie-star parts, and an actor's always an actor until he does a movie-star part. — Lynda Obst

The first thing you notice about women in Hollywood, besides their low percentage of body fat, is how few are married. And the number of great-looking, successful single women without a social life is staggering ... The most glaring misconception about Hollywood is that it is the romance capital of the world. — Lynda Obst

Love and friendship, two of life's abiding rewards, are endangered species in Hollywood. People crave both, mistaking alliance for friendship, lust for love, and ambition for both. — Lynda Obst

Information is currency ... Power is a place as well as a verb; it is inside the information tent. — Lynda Obst

It is just as important to move on in the wake of stunning success as in the wake of disaster. — Lynda Obst

Every single one of us who has been a 'Woman in Film' for more than five minutes is sick of the phrase 'Women in Film.' — Lynda Obst

There is a fine line between perseverance and madness. — Lynda Obst

To whom one reports is a unit of measure. It measures the exact distance between the player and the center of power. It is the closest we can get to a calibrated answer to the question 'How big am I?' More than the size of an executive's office or even his title, which no one remembers anyway, the fewer people between the player and a 'yes,' the more powerful he is. — Lynda Obst

Always remember the famous adage about the movie business: You can't make a living, you can only get rich. — Lynda Obst

One of our jobs is to keep women working, which we do by keeping women coming to the movies. And doing that means making good, smart, often funny movies that women can identify with-with terrific dialogue we all remember and cherish, and stories that illuminate our lives and decisions and turning points. — Lynda Obst

The key to moving a maybe to a yes is to make the buyer feel as though other buyers have already said yes ... It helps if it's true, but it never is. No one wants to be the first yes. Why is this? I don't know, but I think it's anthropological. — Lynda Obst

Like the tectonic plate it sits upon, Hollywood is subject to seismic jolts and constant tremors. Each season erupts with a new champion, and every so often a genuine earthquake will tear down the apparently secure infrastructure. — Lynda Obst

Nerve, not talent, is the one necessary and sufficient trait for success. (Wouldn't it be ideal if it were talent? But talent with no nerve is like the sound of one hand clapping. — Lynda Obst

The lack of women directors is a sad fact of life. Kathryn Bigelow's thrilling Best Director win may help turn things around. — Lynda Obst

Directing is the last frontier for women in the movie business. We are studio heads, we are producers and we are writers, but we are not directors in any numbers. — Lynda Obst

Everything can be undone, including success. — Lynda Obst

What turns a work crisis into a life crisis is the infusion of dread. — Lynda Obst

The only way I can access all my strength is to relax ... The paradox is that you must learn to be relaxed while using all your power. — Lynda Obst

My goal has been to learn how to get movies made without losing sight of the reasons I began. I have had to learn to recognize the insidious nature of the beast without becoming one. — Lynda Obst