Marlon Brando: Give Too Much

By Telephone

1990

It is impossible to give too much--in anything. This is a myth behind which the lazy and the untalented and the stingy perpetually hide. While you can't give too much, you can spread the gifts unwisely, without balance, and then your contributions look bad, unfocused.

I think that when you work, you give too much to the study of the part; you give too much to the rehearsal with your comrades; you give too much to the contemplation of the dreams and the fears and the traumas and the triumphs of the character; you give too much to the audiences who show up, or to the director who trains a camera on your attempts.

You always, always give too much.

It will drive you crazy at times, but the point is never going to be how you turn out, but how your work turns out; how it reaches and moves and changes people.

Give too much. Wear yourself out. Use it all up.

When you are at your most exhausted, at the edge of insanity, you are only halfway to the goal.

It's scary, but it's worth it, and it's what people deserve.

© 2013 James Grissom