Free speech is not to be regulated like diseased cattle and impure butter. The audience that hissed yesterday may applaud today, even for the same performance.
—William O. Douglas (1898–1980) American Judge
The history of modern art is also the history of the progressive loss of art’s audience. Art has increasingly become the concern of the artist and the bafflement of the public.
—Paul Gauguin (1848–1903) French Post-Impressionist Painter
If it’s a good movie, the sound could go off and the audience would still have a perfectly clear idea of what was going on.
—Alfred Hitchcock (1899–1980) British-born American Film Director, Film Producer
I still get very scared when I step in front of a live audience.
—Adam Sandler (b.1966) American Actor
When a subject is highly controversial… one cannot hope to tell the truth. One can only show how one came to hold whatever opinion one does hold. One can only give one’s audience the chance of drawing their own conclusions as they observe the limitations, the prejudices, the idiosyncrasies of the speaker.
—Virginia Woolf (1882–1941) English Novelist
The only way to win audiences is to tell people about the life and death of Christ. Every other approach is a waste.
—Fulton J. Sheen (1895–1979) American Catholic Religious Leader, Theologian
I have no idea what the audience makes of me.
—Keith Richards (b.1943) English Singer, Songwriter, Musician, Actor
You win an Oscar, it can double the audience that you had before.
—Meryl Streep (b.1949) American Actor
When the audience comes in, it changes the temperature of what you’ve written.
—Stephen Sondheim (b.1930) American Musician, Composer, Songwriter
Every crowd has a silver lining.
—P. T. Barnum (1810–91) American Businessperson, Entertainer
We are sick with fascination for the useful tools of names and numbers, of symbols, signs, conceptions and ideas. Meditation is therefore the art of suspending verbal and symbolic thinking for a time, somewhat as a courteous audience will stop talking when a concert is about to begin.
—Alan Watts (1915–73) British-American Philosopher, Author
In the world’s audience hall, the simple blade of grass sits on the same carpet with the sunbeams, and the stars of midnight.
—Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) Bengali Poet, Polymath
When I tried to branch out into comedy, I didn’t do very well at it, so I went back to doing what I do naturally well, or what the audience expects from me – action pictures.
—Sylvester Stallone (b.1946) American Actor, Film Director, Screenwriter
Some writers take to drink, others take to audiences.
—Gore Vidal (1925–48) American Novelist, Essayist, Journalist, Playwright
I try to do something the audience might not have seen before. Like if I’m gonna kiss a girl I wanna kiss her like a girl has never been kissed. Like maybe I would kick her legs out from under her and catch her right before she hits the ground and then kiss her.
—Jim Carrey (b.1962) Canadian Actor, Comedian
The role of a comedian is to make the audience laugh, at a minimum of once every fifteen seconds.
—Lenny Bruce (1925–66) American Comedian, Writer, Social Critic, Satirist
I never failed to convince an audience that the best thing they could do was to go away.
—Thomas Love Peacock (1785–1866) English Satirist, Novelist, Author
It requires wisdom to understand wisdom: the music is nothing if the audience is deaf.
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974) American Journalist, Political Commentator, Writer
Lead the audience by the nose to the thought.
—Laurence Olivier (1907–89) English Actor, Producer, Director
The lecturer should give the audience full reason to believe that all his powers have been exerted for their pleasure and instruction.
—Michael Faraday (1791–1867) British Physicist, Chemist, Experimentalist
In the old days villains had moustaches and kicked the dog. Audiences are smarter today. They don’t want their villain to be thrown at them with green limelight on his face. They want an ordinary human being with failings.
—Alfred Hitchcock (1899–1980) British-born American Film Director, Film Producer
An audience is always warming but it must never be necessary to your work.
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946) American Writer
Instinct taught me 20 years ago to pace a song or a concert performance. That translates into pacing a story, pleasing a reading audience.
—Jimmy Buffett (b.1946) American Musician, Author
Not content to have the audience in the palm of his hand, he goes one further and clinches his fist.
—Kenneth Tynan (1927–80) English Theatre Critic, Writer
The director is simply the audience. So the terrible burden of the director is to take the place of that yawning vacuum, to be the audience and to select from what happens during the day which movement shall be a disaster and which a gala night. His job is to preside over accidents.
—Orson Welles (1915–85) American Film Director, Actor
You can be the most artistically perfect performer in the world, but an audience is like a broad – if you’re indifferent, Endsville.
—Frank Sinatra (1915–1998) American Singer
The audience is the best judge of anything. They cannot be lied to. Truth brings them closer. A moment that lags – they’re gonna cough.
—Barbra Streisand (b.1942) American Musician, Actor, Songwriter