James Franco quotes: the dude who does everything on everything he’s done.
“Create your world around your work. Create your work around your life. Let other people help you shape it.”
“You are successful if you are able to work on the kind of material that you want to – if your life conforms to your dreams, regardless of outside acceptance or acclaim.”
“In any creative endeavor, you do have to sort of take your shots. Nobody is going to beg you to go into the creative arts. So, if you want to pursue a career in something like acting or writing, the motor and the drive have to come from you. And that does take courage because, (A) a lot of people want to do it, and (B) it’s hard. So, you have to have the guts to put yourself out there and go for it in spite of the world saying, ‘You know, it would be so much easier, if you didn’t pursue this.’ So, it does take guts.”
“They’re just peanut butter and jealous! Haters gonna hate, and ain’t-ers gonna ain’t.”
“All is good. Don’t worry, the pain will help you. You’ll get into some trouble, but it will work out in the end.”
“The masks are just as important as the reality. The masks are our reality. Everyone’s reality. Life is a performance. So if life is your grand performance, have you made good choices?”
“You want to be interesting? Be interested.”
“There’s no relationship that I find that’s closer than a creative relationship.”
“It’s basically the best job in the world. If you’re fortunate enough – and I consider myself fortunate – you get to work with your friends and you get to work on projects that interest you.”
“There’s so much pressure put on relationships to deliver the satisfaction of life. And to me, that is just not the answer. I feel like it should be something in addition to what you love or be a part of that.”
“In the end, I do have a group of friends and teachers whose opinions I respect, and so I guess I just have to be content with their feedback.”
“I love collaboration of all kinds, and I love the way that collaboration pulls me into directions I wouldn’t go in if I was working on my own.”
“When I was younger, I thought, ‘Okay, I’m supposed to do this project because it’ll help my career,’ but that didn’t work because I ended up doing movies that I worked really hard on but I didn’t really like and they didn’t turn out well, so it was like I lost double. Once I just started working with people and projects I believed in, everything changed and I suddenly had a career that I loved and that I was proud of.”
“I was an English major at UCLA when I was 18, and then I left after a year to start acting. I was educating myself during that time.”
“I might have to stumble a little bit more in public than others, but that’s fine, I don’t mind, I’ve developed a thick skin.”
“My job is what I love. I don’t need an escape from it. I don’t need a vacation in the traditional sense, like I would if I had a job I hated.”
“I was kind of scared of failing at acting. Dreams and expectations also have the very dark flip side of disappointment, broken dreams.”
“Challenges are rewarding and fun.”
“When I was a young actor, I just didn’t understand how to function in this business as an artist. It is a business, it’s called the film business for a reason – there’s money involved. But on the flip side, now I do not let the business side of it rule either. It’s a balance.”
“If the work is good, what does it matter? I’m doing it because I love it. Why not do as many things I love as I can? As long as the work is good.”
“They say living well is the best revenge but sometimes writing well is even better.”
“When I started writing after my career as an actor, I knew that that other life in the film industry would be pulled into my writing life and that people would see me not as an author but as an actor starting to write.”
“I am not going to be the guy who’s not pulling his weight. I still work really hard, but I like to think I’m a little smarter about at least the type of movie I’m getting into.”
“I become kind of obsessive about research.”
“Sometimes it is painful to be oneself; at other times it seems impossible to escape oneself.”
“Always have one artistic thing that is pure, at least one thing, where you don’t compromise. You can do other things to make money, but have one pure area.”
“I feel there are so many things in this world that have been and are being created that I could spend the rest of my life thinking about, and I couldn’t cover all the things I’m interested in. That to me is what makes life sweet: learning and exploring.”
“I know I’m not perfect. And, who knows, maybe a part of it has to do with self-obsession. But it’s also about using this weird thing that is a public persona as raw material for creative projects.”
“All I know is that when I needed McDonald’s, McDonald’s was there for me.”
“I used to care about how I looked. Now I don’t care as much. Maybe it’s because I’m so handsome.”
“The selfie is the new way to look someone right in the eye and say, ‘Hello, this is me.'”
“I’ve decided I can’t really control people’s perceptions of me. All I can do is decide on what I work on and how hard I work on it.”
“If this is the only life, then why am I not just doing everything I want to do?”
“I pride myself in taking responsibility for the things I’ve done.”
“I am very grateful for my life. I think one of the keys to not being depressed is to find gratitude and to be grateful for what you have. So I am grateful for what I have.”
“But I don’t want to die! I have so much to do!”
