Stephen Sondheim

“The more restrictions you have, the easier anything is to write.”

“My idea of heaven is not writing.”

“I think 'lunch' is one of the funniest words in the world.”

“Nowadays, there are sometimes more producers than there are people in the cast, because it takes that much money to put a show on.”

“One of the hardest things about writing lyrics is to make the lyrics sit on the music in such a way that you're not aware there was a writer there.”

“The dumbing down of the country reflects itself on Broadway. The shows get dumber, and the public gets used to them.”

“Art, in itself, is an attempt to bring order out of chaos.”

“If you force yourself to write away from the piano, you come up with more inventive things. If you're too good a piano player, as some composers are, the music may become flavorless and glib. And if you're not a very good pianist, you're limited to the same patterns.”

“After the Rodgers and Hammerstein revolution, songs became part of the story, as opposed to just entertainments in between comedy scenes.”

“The nice thing about doing a crossword puzzle is, you know there is a solution.”

“Music straightjackets a poem and prevents it from breathing on its own, whereas it liberates a lyric. Poetry doesn't need music; lyrics do.”

“My mother wanted me off her hands. She was a working woman. She designed clothes, and she was a celebrity collector. It's my mother's ambition to be a celebrity.”

“By the time I was 22, I was a professional. A young and flawed professional, but not an amateur.”