Masur Quotes & Sayings

I nodded sagely. "If we don't succeed, we run the risk of failure." Masur looked at me quizzically. "Dan Quayle said that," I added. Whether he actually did or not, I liked the quote. — Joseph Finder

The deaf community is in a favorable position because they have a national theatre and training groups of their own to get them started. Deaf actors have often acquired very valuable skills and experience before they get their break. — Richard Masur

I had a very low voice for the character in the show. I said, "That's not actually my voice. That's the character's voice." I'm being such an actor. — Richard Masur

Spelling is very easy to practice yourself whereas signing is not. So I would sit on the subway riding around New York and I would spell whatever I would see. When I watched a movie I would spell words as they came up. — Richard Masur

There is no relation to sound for deaf people. It is a totally different mental process. — Richard Masur

I wouldn't say I've changed my mind. I changed some of my natural habits, some of my natural character. — Kurt Masur

As I came to New York, it was for me a new beginning. To discover what people are living here. What do they need, what do they expect, what would they like to be the image and the performance of the New York Philharmonic? — Kurt Masur

I'm one of the handful of survivors of the guys I came up with. — Richard Masur

In a very real way Norman [Lear] godfathered me into my career. He was the best mentor anybody could have ever had. — Richard Masur

You have to give people the opportunity to prove themselves. — Richard Masur

I always imagined that to bring an orchestra to play together is not enough for a conductor. — Kurt Masur

I'm grateful I got the opportunity to do it because I know this now. If anybody ever asked me to do a daytime show again I would go no, no. I can't do that. Not because it's beneath me. It's above me. It's beyond my resources. — Richard Masur

An orchestra full of stars can be a disaster. — Kurt Masur

Since the composer has said everything, if you discover everything, it will be enough and you will be a happy man. Don't try to say it's your taste, and because of that you are changing this or that. And I must say this respect is still there. — Kurt Masur

For example, the first time McDonald's put a deaf person in a commercial they saw a jump in sales. I think that happens with other kinds of disabilities and products and that is something that is being realized more and more. — Richard Masur

Very interesting show. It's "Hotel" with the E missing. Hot L Baltimore. It was about a rundown hotel which had become kind of a residential not quite welfare but almost welfare hotel with a very bizarre collection of people.The desk clerk was played by Jamie Cromwell. That was his first big thing. Conchata Ferrell played April, the main of the two prostitutes, and my character didn't exist in the [stage] show. — Richard Masur

I moved out to L.A. in July and Hot L Baltimore started in September or October. So I had done a few things. I'd done a Mary [Tyler Moore]. I'd done a Waltons. I hadn't done a Rhoda yet I don't think. — Richard Masur

You know as I started as a shy young conductor, I always wanted to cooperate. To build up the musicians. To help them to be better than without a conductor. And sometimes young talented musicians have to be encouraged. — Kurt Masur

Being an actor myself I realize that all actors believe they are qualified to play any role. If you showed me a script with a black woman character I would tell you that I could do it. That is what we do. We act as if we are someone else. — Richard Masur

What I never overcame is a kind of shyness. — Kurt Masur

She [Susan Lucci] was extraordinary. She wouldn't look at the scene until you walked in to rehearse it. It was amazing to me. That's the impression I got anyway. — Richard Masur

I was doing a play in New York, which we had done in New Haven, Connecticut. It was an American premiere of a play called The Changing Room written by a wonderful man named David Story. It was about a rugby team in the North of England. It got just screaming rave reviews. At that time, virtually every major critic went up to the Long Wharf Theater to see a new play like that. — Richard Masur

If every school would hire two more music teachers, we would need two fewer police officers. — Kurt Masur

At the age of 16, something happened with my finger and the doctor told me, you never can be a organist or pianist, so think about what you do with music. — Kurt Masur

I did my first movie,a movie called Whiffs, which very few people ever saw. — Richard Masur

In South America, I heard the 8th Symphony of Beethoven. And the young conductor thought, Beethoven must be heroic. But this is piece which shouldn't be heroic. And this was such a misunderstanding, such a deep misunderstanding. — Kurt Masur

I still to this day maintain that in that million-and-a-half feet of film [Heaven's Gate] that we shot, we thought we were making a great American film. I honestly believe that Michael [Cimino] was under a tremendous amount of pressure, and Michael's response to pressure from what I saw was to double down and to get more aggressive and to get more kind of arrogant, but I don't think it was real. I think it was the response to pressure. — Richard Masur

Even I had no opportunity to conduct very many concerts after World War II. — Kurt Masur

I mean God knows I've done tons of schlock during the course of my career and stuff that's been very low budget and really pressed for time, but I've never had an experience like this. I kept saying to people, "How do you do this?" I said to Susan [Lucci], "How do you do it?" I don't recall exactly what she answered me but it was something like "Close my eyes and think of England. You just do it." — Richard Masur

I know deaf people. I have discussed the issues with them I've also thought about them a lot so I have some insights that go a little further than people who haven't had contact with the deaf community. — Richard Masur

If people don't actively knock the scenery over and they get the words out in something approximating the right order, you're moving on. — Richard Masur

I actually then went on to direct an after-school special where one of the characters was deaf. They hired me without even knowing I had any connection to the community. — Richard Masur

After three days of shooting with Donald [ Sutherland], I was the only one he worked with for the first three days of the movie [The Winter Of Our Discontent] because of the crazy schedule. We [shot] a lot of this stuff, some of it incredibly intense and emotional. We had never had a conversation during that whole time. We didn't have time. — Richard Masur

And at the same time, I had my very first concert at the age of 16. I hadn't heard a symphony orchestra before, and I was so deeply impressed I said I have to be a conductor. — Kurt Masur

The message of music was also the first thing what I learned from my first teacher. She was an organist too and she was very devoted to what she played, so she had a respect for every piece and she felt that she is not allowed to add something of her own. — Kurt Masur

Even my family laughed at me because they thought this young guy who's always stuttering in front of other people should be in front of 100 musicians and talk to them and leading them. — Kurt Masur

Most profoundly deaf people have speech that is very difficult to understand. — Richard Masur

Very often, if I know the orchestra doesn't know a piece or it's a new piece, I have main ideas about it. But then we start to play and I never talk about places where they played so beautiful and so clear in the beginning that there is nothing to say. — Kurt Masur

Maybe if I'd gone in younger, I wouldn't have had that feeling, but I've seen an enormous amount of changes since the early-'70s in how this stuff is shot. I did the first TV movie ever shot in 18 days; before this film the normal length of shooting a TV movie was between 21 and 26 days. We shot a full-up, two-hour TV movie in 18 days with Donald Sutherland playing the lead, who had never worked on television before. — Richard Masur

I used to be the youngest person on the set [of Bored To Death]. Now I'm very often the oldest person on the set. I feel lucky about that, to be honest. Lena [Dunham], by the way is a doll to me. So much fun to work with and really open. — Richard Masur

And I always tried to be not a star. To be someone who people like to talk to. — Kurt Masur

And if you are strong enough, then you can grow as a conductor more and more. — Kurt Masur

I did Bored To Death with Jason [Schwartzman] and Zach Galifianakis and those guys. I mean, how lucky can you be that you get to be the old guy? I get to be Robert Preston to them now. That's what I feel. My job is to pass on what Preston and other people gave to me, which was show up, take the work seriously, don't take yourself seriously, and have a good time and be of service. Be there to support. — Richard Masur

You have to change your mind with every orchestra because every orchestra has a different character. — Kurt Masur

I believe so, but at first he must know. He must know in which spirit Beethoven has composed this piece. He must try to study that. And he must find out in which station of life of Beethoven he did. — Kurt Masur

I did a film many years ago called The Man Without A Face.Gaby [Hoffmann] was in with Mel Gibson. That was his directing debut. He did a great job. — Richard Masur

I have to say I was very lucky in this [movie] business. I was in the right place at the right time when I first got started. — Richard Masur

If you go to Japan for instance, you should know that they have a different way of playing Beethoven or Brahms. But if you play with them Mozart, Debussy, Mendelssohn, they have a wonderful light feeling for that. — Kurt Masur

I am so grateful for One Day At A Time, even though for years and years and years people would go, "Oh, you were on One Day At A Time." I [am on the show] for about seven months and then this haunts me for the rest of my life. No, I had no regrets. — Richard Masur

I've worked with a ginormous number of people over the years. What happens when you've been around for a while, when you run into people whose work you've seen and liked and they have seen and liked your work, there's a sense of you kind of know each other even though you don't. — Richard Masur

Sometimes if you have very confident people, you have to tell them please, be polite, there are other players are good enough as you and you should never speak out of an orchestra. — Kurt Masur

I walk into office, which is the casting office for CBS in New York. Mainly what they cast out of this office was the CBS daytime shows. I go in and walk into this room which every seat is filled with young African-American boys and girls and they were in their teens. I went, "I'm in the wrong place. Why am I here? What's going on?"So I go in and meet Norman [Lear]. — Richard Masur

You have to give access to people with disabilities but there is no requirement to hire them. What I mean by affirmative obligation is that producers must take the necessary steps to include opportunities for people with disabilities and a vast majority of them do. — Richard Masur

I would never ever, ever, ever, ever do it again [All My Children]. It was the scariest thing I've ever done. I have such respect for people who do it, who can do it. What happened was they caught me at a good moment. I could use the money and this came along and it was with Susan and I thought, Susan Lucci. I have to do this. — Richard Masur

People who just wanted to make it work and knew it was going to be a real challenge. We were on the beach the first day and Donald [Sutherland] and I are playing best friends our whole lives. We met each other for 10 seconds the night before and we're sitting on a beach lining up a shot that we shoot a few minutes later, never having had a conversation with each other and then end up going skinny dipping in the Pacific Ocean buck-ass naked, not knowing who the other person is. — Richard Masur

I worked on scores. I went to the musical library in Berlin which is very famous. I discovered that we had scores of Beethoven, printed scores of Beethoven, that are full of mistakes. Not the wrong or false notes, but the wrong dynamic, understandable things. — Kurt Masur

I was different from most young conductors today. — Kurt Masur

No one will ever argue that someone could have played Helen Keller better than Patty Duke. It was an incredibly demanding role and I don't think anyone can argue that it was a false performance. — Richard Masur

But people who think they can project themselves into deafness are mistaken because you can't. And I'm not talking about imagining what a deaf person's whole life is like I even mean just realizing what it is like for an instant. — Richard Masur

I consider anybody who has been able to make a living in this business [movie business] without having to do something else for a living for any period of time let alone 43 years would be a miracle. — Richard Masur

And to understand this, I think this is a most important point where I would like always to be understood what we do with the New York Philharmonic. That the meaning of the music is number one. — Kurt Masur

After we did [All In The Family], that ended up being a real love fest all around. Me and Norman, Norman [Lear] and me, Rob Reiner, everybody liked everybody. So about six or seven months later I moved out to L.A. and I got a call that Norman wanted to see me. I came in and he said "ABC has given me a property that they just optioned to make into a TV series. It's from a play called Hot L Baltimore, and I want you to be in it." — Richard Masur

Young conductors who are confident enough, they very often have success. — Kurt Masur

I can go in front of an orchestra. I can go in front of an audience. But if you see me walking through an audience in the reception or through a lot of people, I'm still shy. — Kurt Masur