Alan Ball Quotes

In this age of vampires, what I love about 'True Blood' the most is that it's a post-modern take on it. 'Sookie Stackhouse' series author Charlaine Harris and 'True Blood' creator Alan Ball turned that whole mythology upside-down ... It's not just about vampires. It's about a lot of different things. ~ Michelle Forbes

I certainly believe that what we perceive as humans is just the tip of the iceberg. I don't necessarily believe in vampires or werewolves or that kind of thing, but I believe there is definitely a realm we don't necessarily have access to. ~ Alan Ball

Well did you call the hypothetical hardware store and buy a theoretical chainsaw?
Pam to Jessica, True Blood ~ Alan Ball

I am a little suspicious of industry paradigms. I feel like so many movies and TV shows feel so familiar because of over-reliance on these paradigms. ~ Alan Ball

I guess in America we're so sold on this ideal of the perfect, well-adjusted family that is able to confront any conflict and, with true love and understanding, work things through. I'm sure they do exist, but I never knew any of them. ~ Alan Ball

I think sexuality is a window into someone's soul. ~ Alan Ball

I think all writers are armchair psychologists to some degree or another, and I think a character's sexuality is fascinating. It's a great way to really get at the root of their identity, because it's such a personal thing. ~ Alan Ball

I was conveniently bisexual for a long time, and then I went, 'Come on, who am I kidding?' And I have to say, it was the single biggest step I took toward emotional well-being, to stop feeling like I had to hide who I am. ~ Alan Ball

And as I stumbled onto Eastern philosophy and Buddhism, it was the first time I had ever read any sort of philosophy that really made a tremendous amount of sense. What I liked that was missing from my experience of Christianity growing up was a sort of acceptance, a sort of being OK with being imperfect and not focusing on the sin. ~ Alan Ball

There are times when I am directing, and there are a couple of moments I didn't get the way I wanted, but I know I still have other angles to shoot and I have to be done by noon; I move on. ~ Alan Ball

The idea of celibate vampires is ridiculous. To me, vampires are sex. I don't get a vampire story about abstinence. I don't care about high school students. I find them irritating and uninformed. ~ Alan Ball

Death showed up in my life very early on, so I'm aware of it. If you look at most of the things I write there's a sort of contemplation of mortality - although 'True Blood' doesn't fall into that. Even though there's such a ridiculously high body count! ~ Alan Ball

It's hard for me to get interested in stories that ignore death, which is what American marketing culture would like to do: pretend that death doesn't exist, that you can buy immortality; just buy these products, and you'll be forever young and happy. ~ Alan Ball

I'm aware of 'Twilight,' but I've never seen the movies or read any of the books. Frankly, the story leaves me cold - why do a vampire story about abstinence? ~ Alan Ball

I try to tell the best story, and the story that has some heart and some genuine terror and some social commentary and some comedy and some romance and some sex and some violence. ~ Alan Ball

I'd seen 'Interview with A Vampire' and saw Dracula movies growing up, but I never thought, 'I love vampires; I have to do a show about vampires.' ~ Alan Ball

I guess I could be pretty pissed off about what happened to me, but it's hard to stay mad when there's so much beauty in the world. Sometimes I feel like I'm seeing it all at once, and it's too much; my heart fills up like a balloon that's about to burst. And then I remember to relax, and stop trying to hold onto it. And then it flows through me like rain, and I can't feel anything but gratitude - for every single moment of my stupid, little life. You have no idea what I'm talking about, I'm sure; but don't worry ... .you will someday. ~ Alan Ball

Don't worry, Alan. At least you'll be able to play close to a great team.
(to Alan Ball, who'd just signed for Everton) ~ Bill Shankly

I'm a huge freak, and always have been. I spent the first part of my life trying really desperately not to be one, and it was just a waste of time. ~ Alan Ball

Television viewing has become for me a completely different experience, because I don't watch shows on a weekly basis. I wait until the DVD or I TiVo everything and wait until the end of a season and watch it all over a weekend. For me that's a really satisfying experience, like reading a book. ~ Alan Ball

The fact that we die, that makes life important. It's hard to take, but it's the truth. ~ Alan Ball

In my own life, I think legends of supernatural, mythic things are really just a manifestation of the collective unconscious. So I don't really get freaked out. I mean certainly, you read about things people did to each other in the pursuit of some mystical or occult goal, and it's horrifying. But that's just human nature. ~ Alan Ball

Somebody asked me, 'Why do people like vampires so much?' This was right after Obama had been elected and I said, 'Because we just spent eight years being sucked dry by one.' ~ Alan Ball

Sometimes I feel like I'm seeing it all at once and it's too much. My heart fills up like a balloon that's about to burst. ~ Alan Ball

I'm at the point in my life where I don't want to work as hard. Actually, I've had to take a good hard look at workaholism and it's effect on one's mental health. ~ Alan Ball

His POV: Angela lies beneath us, embarrassed and vulnerable. This is not the mythically carnal creature of Lester's fantasies; this is a nervous child. ~ Alan Ball

Most of us live in artificial environments and then we go to work in artificial environments and the world becomes something that you see through a window. ~ Alan Ball

It's a great thing when you realize you still have the ability to surprise yourself. Makes you wonder what else you can do that you've forgotten about. ~ Alan Ball

Once Everton has touched you nothing will be the same. ~ Alan Ball

Life is suffering. We have desires and expectations and egos, and we compare the reality we have, which is miraculous and wondrous, with this reality we desire. That somehow distances us from actually taking part fully with the reality we do have, and that creates suffering. For me, the thing that I love is that it's all about the present moment. ~ Alan Ball

Beneath his zen-like tranquility lurks something wounded… and dangerous. ~ Alan Ball

The important thing is that he shook hands with us over the phone. ~ Alan Ball

You cannot hold a child accountable to the same standards that you hold an adult accountable to. ~ Alan Ball

We live in a time where there's an alienation factor. There's a certain disconnection. We don't have any real sense of community anymore. ~ Alan Ball

The difference between film and TV is the pace. You don't have the leisure of time in television. ~ Alan Ball

But the truth is that L.A. was never entirely real anyway, as Steely Dan, Randy Newman, Warren Zevon, Larry David and Alan Ball all understood. ~ Barney Hoskyns

Depending on what happens with my directing career, I don't think I'll stop writing, even if I crash and burn in movies and TV. I'll go back to plays. Even if I crash and burn there, I'll write a novel. That's the great thing about writing is that you don't have to wait for people to give you permission to do it. ~ Alan Ball

As a culture, we are not comfortable with mortality. We do not accept it the way other cultures do. We cling to youth, and we don't want to die. It's like, 'Well, too bad, we do.' ~ Alan Ball

Ultimately, physical resemblance isn't as important as whether this person can bring this character to life in a way that's compelling and makes me care about what happens to them. ~ Alan Ball

I definitely see the good in people. Certainly in my own life I strive to be somebody who is functional and well adjusted and can face conflict in a non-emotional and non-destructive way, and those are the people I try to surround myself with in my life. But as characters, they bore me. ~ Alan Ball

I believe forgiveness is possible for everybody, for everything, but I'm a Buddhist. ~ Alan Ball

Happy relationships are boring. We all want them in our own life. But I don't want to watch them on TV. ~ Alan Ball

I certainly feel fortunate in my career to have been able to continue to work in different mediums. I don't ever want to be the guy who gets really good at one thing and just does that over and over and over again. ~ Alan Ball

The ego is kind of a big, unwieldy thing. It's not so easily tamed or subdued. ~ Alan Ball

I always choose to look, as much as one can, at the supernatural not being something that exists outside of nature, but a deeper, fundamental heart of nature that perhaps humans ... have lost touch with. It's a more primal thing than perhaps we are attuned to in our modern, self-aware way of life. ~ Alan Ball

It's easy to look at the vampires as a metaphor for any feared or misunderstood group. It's also easy to look at them as a metaphor for a shadow organization that says one thing and has a completely different agenda on their mind, and anybody who gets in their way, they just get rid of them. Does that sound familiar? ~ Alan Ball

I'm from the South, so while I personally find it impossible to live there, I still have a fondness for it as a geographical region. ~ Alan Ball

A lot of times, the choice of the right song will save a scene. Or there will be a scene that's a little flat and you put in the right song and somehow it just comes alive. ~ Alan Ball

You have no idea what I'm talking about, I'm sure. ~ Alan Ball

I don't believe in any particular definition of the afterlife, but I do believe we're spiritual creatures and more than our biology and that energy cannot be destroyed, but can change. I don't know what the afterlife is going to be, but I'm not afraid of it. ~ Alan Ball

Vampires are total sexual metaphors; there's just no way around that. ~ Alan Ball

'Six Feet Under' was about repressing our deepest, most primal impulses, and 'True Blood' is about giving full sway to them all the time. In a way they are like yin and yang. ~ Alan Ball

If a scene is longer than three pages, it better be for a good reason. ~ Alan Ball

I really feel like my goal, and I don't always achieve it, is to do the best work I can do, and stay out of the results. Because ultimately, the result is not what the work is about. There are other people whose jobs are to focus on those results and maximize them, and that's great. Let them do their job. ~ Alan Ball

Obviously death is a theme I'm fascinated by. ~ Alan Ball

Racism is ridiculous no matter where it's coming from. ~ Alan Ball

It's a whole different kind of anxiety. But the great thing about doing a theatre job is that once the ball starts rolling you just have to go with it, it's inexorable. ~ Emily Watson

I think a lot of psychological healing tends to work on that basis. We go into the unconscious to find what's holding you back, so to speak, and I think there is an unconscious body image that may be responsible for the unhealing that's taking place. ~ Fred Alan Wolf

I wonder how many people
I know are out there,
battling demons and leviathans
alone on this cold night.

How many people I know
who tell me they are fine,
and know how to expertly hide
the cry for help behind their eyes.

How many are just
a helping hand away
from a moment that could
better their entire life.

And how many will never ask,
instead ball up these terrible things
inside themselves thinking they
are all alone in their fight.

It is a sobering thought:
Everyone we love and know
and hate are all suffering
in some great or small way.

This is why we must
be swift with our kindness.
make greater efforts at compassion
when we ask someone if they are okay. ~ Nikita Gill

Suddenly, she emitted a loud, long fart, like air escaping a beach ball, exhaust pipe of a Model T, tire-inflating hose at the service station, and this without any forewarning borborygmus. ~ Dennis Vickers

Benny Anger: What's up, doc?
Doc Manhattan: "Up" is a relative concept; it has no intrinsic value. ~ Alan Moore

I am going to stop mainlining my life force / Into your self-esteem: / Air pump girl blowing up boy rubber ball / You can stay flat and go nowhere by yourself ~ Eve Ensler

Women are people too". ~ R. Alan Woods

You are unreliable, Flavia,' he said. 'Utterly unreliable.'
Of course I was! It was one of the things I loved most about myself. ~ Alan Bradley

My eyes widened at the ball of orange fluff squeezing out from under the counter, blinking and stretching.
I looked again, not believing.
"It's a cat," I said, winning the Pulitzer prize for incredible intellect. ~ Kim Harrison

Religion is always falling apart. ~ Alan Watts

Owners want to make their team a winner so they can get more fans in the stands, and that's why they go after the best ball-players and pay 'em what they're worth. ~ Moses Malone

When we, through our educational culture, through the media, through the entertainment culture, give our children the impression that human beings cannot control their passions, we are telling them, in effect, that human beings cannot be trusted with freedom. ~ Alan Keyes

It takes a lot less work to feel good than it does to feel bad. ~ Alan Cohen

I'd signed up not just for Christianity but the established Church of England. That has a particular history and I think we rather lost it in the 19th Century, we became so much part of empire and colonialism, the language of the Church Of England still reflects that Victorian time. As the 20th Century developed, not surprisingly people left the church and I can see the church's role in losing people. ~ Alan Green

Disconnection, separation, division, detachment, disassociation - these are all words that describe
the way we view our world and ourselves. We are disconnected from the Earth herself, separated from the
delicate web she has woven, divided from each other by arbitrary encumbrances, detached from the very
meaning of our existence, and disassociated from the awe and mystery of the world and the universe. Our
daily lives are filled with more events than our elaborate datebooks can contain, we live by the litany "oh,
that there were only more hours in the day," and we bemoan our lot in life. We are scared to death of spiders
and cockroaches, consider the natural world as wild, untamed and therefore dangerous, and resist awareness
into the intricacies of our world for fear of having to take on one more responsibility. ~ Jackie Alan Giuliano

I can't believe that any man would care enough to go to all that trouble. Not for me."
He stopped pacing and approached her. He put his hands on her shoulders and forced her to meet his intense blue gaze. "I am wearing a cravat and cuff links at the godforsaken Beetle Ball. Does this not count as going to trouble for you?"
"But ... that's not for me. Not really."
"Maddie, mo chridhe." His grip on her arms softened to a caress, and his gaze dropped to her mouth. "Like hell it isn't."
-Maddie & Logan ~ Tessa Dare

Somedays you're the cue ball, somedays you are the eight ball ~ Pablo

Knowing God supersedes everything else because it is the supreme cause. Everything else - being, doing, loving, believing, hoping, praising, worshipping, evangelizing, glorifying, enjoying - is an effect. ~ Larry Alan Thompson

Having a narcissistic parent is an early manifestation of a phenomenon termed by some as "co-narcissism." Alan Rappoport describes this as unconsciously adapting to and supporting the narcissistic patterns of another person. He argues that this pattern starts in childhood, with the child having to adjust and calibrate to the narcissistic parent.
Narcissistic parents are not tuned into their children, and the narcissistic parent largely views the child as an object with which to satisfy his or her needs. Narcissistic parents will be overly indulgent and intrusive about some things and detached and uninterested in others. Children in these situations often believe life is unpredictable and strive hard to please "unpleasable" and distracted parents. If you grow up like this, you learn that you are valued for what you did, but only if it was aligned with your parent's wants and needs. It can be a confusing way to grow up and also the perfect set-up for accepting narcissistic behavior as "normal" and then tolerating it from a partner or in other close relationships. ~ Ramani Durvasula

If a machine is expected to be infallible, it cannot also be intelligent. - Alan Turing ~ Stuart Firestein

Most of us live in a safe world. We don't have to fight for our values, we don't have to fight for our freedom, we don't have a sense of injustice. ~ Alan J. Pakula

It's a whole other ball game and I am glad that I fit into that space where, whatever it is that you want to do and you are doing as long as you are happy with it, then you know What the Heck! ~ Bootsy Collins

You can live as a ghost, waiting for death to come, or you can dance. ~ Alan Gratz

Experience really does make you better, man. ~ Alan Vega

The sign seemed like her fortune, her horoscope, her Magic 8 Ball answer. ~ Melissa Senate

You do not play a sonata in order to reach the final chord, and if the meanings of things were simply in ends, composers would write nothing but finales. ~ Alan W. Watts

Slavery in West Africa, and in Rome and in the Mediterranean, was something different than slavery in America. ~ Edward Ball

A visit to Israel is always an experience in cognitive dissonance. The Israel you personally see and hear is so completely different from the Israel you read and hear about in the media. ~ Alan Dershowitz

Your father picks you up from prison in a stolen Dodge Neon with an 8-ball in the glove
compartment and a hooker named Mandy in the back seat. ~ Dennis Lehane

I was a fairly good amateur musician, and I was an average professional. But the one thing I saw was that the big band business was fading. ~ Alan Greenspan

The things that are most popular are usually rubbish, stand up for what's important, not popular. ~ Alan Moore

Certainly as actors, and maybe as directors, you've got to hang on to something childlike. You've got to know what play is. I haven't worked with Mike Leigh, but I know him very well and there's something open in his eyes about what's in front of him. And the same is true of Alfonso in a Mexican, mad way. There's an enthusiastic response to something. Neil Jordan, the same, when he gets excited . You just want to know there's a human being in there. ~ Alan Rickman

Film-making is a physically hard job. ~ Alan Parker

Everything you think, feel, say, and do contains seeds of more of itself. ~ Alan Cohen

I did a musical that I don't think anybody ever saw, called 'One Shining Moment,' and in that cast was Megan Mullally and Kevin Anderson. ~ Alan Ruck

I want to do roles that are fun and challenging and I want to try different things. I don't want to keep doing Monster's Ball over and over and over again. I want to keep doing my career the way that I was doing it before I won the Oscar. ~ Halle Berry

When the ball that was my heart ws broken, ... laughter fell out. ~ Beatrice Wood

If I've made myself clear, I've misspoken. ~ Alan Greenspan

Learning French is trivial: the word for horse is cheval, and everything else follows in the same way. ~ Alan Perlis

Who's that with you?' Stephen asked.
'Death,' I said.
Edward bowed.
'Trust you to bring death to the ball, ma petite. ~ Laurell K. Hamilton

Any education that matters is liberal. All the saving truths, all the healing graces that distinguish a good education from a bad one or a full education from a half empty one are contained in that word. ~ Alan K. Simpson

When you find out that there was never anything in the dark side to be afraid of ... Nothing is left but to love. ~ Alan W. Watts

Contractions. Kane's stomach dropped right out of his body. He stared down at her, his mind going fuzzy. That was one of those words like menstruation, period, or female products . The list just wasn't uttered in male company. Contractions fit right in there. God. This was not happening. He forced his brain under control, ignoring the pounding in his head and the roaring in his ears.

He studied Rose's body carefully. She wasn't due for another four or five weeks, right? He knew when she got pregnant. When he'd first seen her, she had looked slim, but that had been an illusion. On the other hand, she never looked as - big - as she did at that moment."What?" Rose demanded, glaring up at him.

The warning signal flashed bright red in Kane's head. Telling a woman she was as big as a beach ball wouldn't win any points. How did one describe how she looked? A basketball? Volleyball? He studied her furious little face. Yeah. He was in trouble no matter what he said. Description was out of the question. He needed diplomacy, something that flew out the window when he was near her and she said words like contractions.He'd jump out of a plane without hesitation in the heart of enemy territory, but damn it all, ask him to kill someone, not deliver babies. She didn't take her eyes off him, and that expression on her scowling face demanded an answer. ~ Christine Feehan

What's your name?" he asked above the roar of the music.
She leaned close. "My name is Wind," she whispered. "And Rain. And Bone and Dust. My name is a snippet of a half-remembered song."
He chuckled a low, delightful sound. She was drunk and silly, and so full of the glory of being young and alive and in the capital of the world that she could hardly contain herself.
"I have no name," she purred. "I am whoever the keepers of my fate tell me to be."
He grasped her by her wrist, running a thumb along the sensitive sknin underneath. "Then let me call you Mine for a dance or two. ~ Sarah J. Maas