All writing is discipline, but screenwriting is a drill sergeant.
Robert MckeeRead
Given the choice between trivial material brilliantly told versus profound material badly told, an audience will always choose the trivial told brilliantly.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Audiences often prefer entertaining stories over profound messages if the latter is poorly presented.
This quote by Robert McKee highlights the importance of storytelling and presentation in communication. It suggests that even the most profound ideas can be overlooked if they are not shared in an engaging and captivating manner, while superficial topics can capture an audience's attention when delivered with skill and flair.
Themes
StorytellingPresentationAudienceEngagementCommunication
In practice
Example use cases
During a workshop on effective communication, this quote can be used to stress the importance of presentation skills.
More from Robert Mckee
All quotes βStories are the creative conversion of life itself into a more powerful, clearer, more meaningful experience. They are the currency of human contact.
Robert MckeeRead
Storytelling is the most powerful way to put ideas into the world today.
Robert MckeeRead
Good story' means something worth telling that the world wants to hear. Finding this is your lonely task...But the love of a good story, of terrific characters and a world driven by your passion, courage, and creative gifts is still not enough. Your goal must be a good story well told.
Robert MckeeRead
Anxious, inexperienced writers obey rules. Rebellious, unschooled writers break rules. Artists master the form.
Robert MckeeRead
We rarely know where we are going; writing is a discovery.
Robert MckeeRead
Similar quotes
The things that have been most valuable to me I did not learn in school.
Will SmithRead
Young film makers should learn how to deal with the money and learn how to deal with the power structure. Because it is like a battle.
Martin ScorseseRead
Surely education has no meaning unless it helps you understand the vast experience of life with all its subtleties, with its extraordinary beauty, its sorrows and joys. You may earn degrees, you may have a series of letters after your name and land a good job, but then what? What is the point of it all if in the process your mind becomes dull, weary, stupid?
Jiddu KrishnamurtiRead
We need to let our children grow up to face the world armed with knowledge, with much more knowledge than we ourselves had at their age. It is scary, but the alternative is worse.
Daniel DennettRead
Respect children because they're human beings and they deserve respect, and they'll grow up to be better people.
Benjamin SpockRead
I knew chemistry would be worse, because I'd seen a big card of the ninety-odd elements hung up in the chemistry lab, and all the perfectly good words like gold and silver and cobalt and aluminum were shortened to ugly abbreviations with different decimal numbers after them.
Sylvia PlathRead