"We must have a pie. Stress cannot exist in the presence of a pie."
— David Mamet (Boston Marriage)

"It's only words... unless they're true."
— David Mamet

""You know, I once read an interesting book which said that, uh, most people lost in the wilds, they, they die of shame. Yeah, see, they die of shame. 'What did I do wrong? How could I have gotten myself into this?' And so they sit there and they... die. Because they didn't do the one thing that would save their lives. Thinking.""
— David Mamet

"My motto is “Be Prepared.” I am told this is also the motto of the Boy Scouts, but, if so, this only proves that they were acting according to my motto earlier than I."
— David Mamet

"Every reiteration of the idea that _nothing matters_ debases the human spirit.

Every reiteration of the idea that there is no drama in modern life, there is only dramatization, that there is no tragedy, there is only unexplained misfortune, debases us. It denies what we know to be true. In denying what we know, we are as a nation which cannot remember its dreams--like an unhappy person who cannot remember his dreams and so denies that he does dream, and denies that there are such things as dreams."
— David Mamet (Writing in Restaurants: Essays and Prose)

"We're all put to the test... but it never comes in the form or at the point we would prefer, does it?"
— David Mamet

"Life in the movie business is like the beginning of a new love affair: it's full of surprises, and you're constantly getting fucked."
— David Mamet (Speed-the-plow: A play)

"I go out there. I'm out there every day. [Pause] There is nothing out there. "
— David Mamet

"[I]n the abstract, we may envision an Olympian perfection of perfect beings in Washington doing the business of their employers, the people, but any of us who has ever been at a zoning meeting with our property at stake is aware of the urge to cut through all the pernicious bullshit and go straight to firearms."
— David Mamet

"We live in oppressive times. We have, as a nation, become our own thought police; but instead of calling the process by which we limit our expression of dissent and wonder ‘censorship,’ we call it ‘concern for commercial viability."
— David Mamet

"Every scene should be able to answer three questions: "Who wants what from whom? What happens if they don't get it? Why now?""
— David Mamet (Bambi vs. Godzilla: On the Nature, Purpose, and Practice of the Movie Business)

"How was her crumbcake?
oh.. from the store...
......."
— David Mamet

"Art is an expression of joy and awe. It is not an attempt to share one's virtues and accomplishments with the audience, but an act of selfless spirit.
"
— David Mamet (True and False: Heresy and Common Sense for the Actor)