Terry Gilliam quotes

Born
22 November 1940 Minneapolis, Minnesota, US.

Occupation
Screenwriter, director.

Terry Gilliam is an American-born British screenwriter, film director, animator, actor, comedian.

Movies
12 Monkeys (1995)
Brazil (1985)
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998)
Monty Python and the Holy (1975)
The Fisher King (1991)

Literally overnight, I became an animator… and one that was well-known.
– Terry Gilliam

I keep referring to them in the plural but all I’m dealing with is Bob. I don’t know where Harvey fits in the equation. He was very present at the beginning, winding his brother up. I don’t know where he is now.
– Terry Gilliam

We did Holy Grail, and I got my name up there as one of the directors. After that, I started moving more and more down the line I wanted to, which was making movies.
– Terry Gilliam

Gorillaz virtually changed my wife…sorry, I mean, life…no, actually, it was my wife.
– Terry Gilliam

We took up the offer with the BBC, and that was Monty Python’s Flying Circus. I didn’t have to submit my ideas to the group. I used to turn up on the days we recorded with a can of film under my arm, and in it went.
– Terry Gilliam

I can feel my dreams but I can’t remember them.
– Terry Gilliam

It’s 85 million dollars and they got to be really careful because they are going to need me.
– Terry Gilliam

Actually, I began to think that maybe there is a god, after all. Or maybe it’s a different one. The old one got fired.
– Terry Gilliam

I was doing political cartoons and getting angry to the point where I felt I was going to have to start making and throwing bombs. I thought I was probably a better cartoonist than a bomb maker.
– Terry Gilliam

I’ve always sworn that not having enough money has saved me from mediocrity.
– Terry Gilliam

I was getting frustrated with America. It’s interesting how as simple a thing as, like, letting your hair grow longer changed in the world in those days.
– Terry Gilliam

All films are learning processes. I am still trying to work out how you make a movie. I didn’t study at film school or any of those things. I didn’t bother with film theory.
– Terry Gilliam

At the first screening, there were a lot of areas that we went around and around about. Then we had our second screening. It played better. It’s almost a reasonable length film now!
– Terry Gilliam

It’s been interesting how kids have had hardly any problems watching it, but adults have more trouble. This happened way back even with Jabberwocky and Time Bandits.
– Terry Gilliam

Hyperbole is something I’d better avoid.
– Terry Gilliam

People used to think we just faked all that stuff… it was all written, rehearsed. The fact that it looks as cobbled together as it does is just that we weren’t very good.
– Terry Gilliam

I was born in 1940 in Minnesota and grew up in the country… dirt roads, swamps, lakes, woods.
– Terry Gilliam

Once the voices are in your head, it’s either make a movie or kill a lot of people.
– Terry Gilliam

John Cleese was with a group called Cambridge Circus, who had come to New York, and we became friends. Years later that produced a certain team effort.
– Terry Gilliam

You get trapped by stories. Though I’ve got this reputation for being out of control, it’s not true, it just happens to be a more interesting story than the truth.
– Terry Gilliam

I’m trying to escape by forming my own kind of world. Basically, I’m trying to encourage others to do the same.
– Terry Gilliam

In advertising, I was frustrated by having to deal with the client. It was the only time I really worked in a proper office, and I didn’t like it-simple as that.
– Terry Gilliam

They make Spy Kids, they make Scream, they make A Scary Movie. This doesn’t do that, so it could be a very bad marriage. I’m trying to keep this potential nightmare quiet because we’re just finishing editing.
– Terry Gilliam