Neverisms

If you must steal, steal away from bad company.

If you must cheat, cheat death.

And if you must drink, drink in the moments that take your breath away.

Remember this practical piece of advice:

Never come into the theatre with mud on your feet.CONSTANTIN STANISLAVSKY

Stanislavsky, speaking metaphorically here, was Russia’s greatest actor in the nineteenth century, and ultimately the country’s most influential theatrical director. After cofounding the Moscow Art Theatre in 1898, he developed the “Stanislavky System” for training actors, an approach that ultimately evolved into “The Method,” popularized by Lee Strasberg and others at The Actors Studio in New York City. He finished his admonition this way:Leave your dust and dirt outside. Check your little worries, squabbles, petty difficulties with your outside clothing—all the things that ruin your life and draw your attention away from your art—at the door.

Never say your salary is so-and-so;

let them make you an offer first and then tell them,

if necessary, what you had in your last engagement.ELLEN TERRY, advice to her nephew John Gielgud

In his 1974 autobiography Early Stages, Gielgud said this was the first of two pieces of invaluable advice he had received from his famous aunt. The second was: “You must never say it is a bad audience. It is your business to make it a good one.”

Never send a monkey to do a man’s job.MARK WAHLBERG, in Planet of the Apes,

a 2001 remake of the 1968 film (screenplay by

William Broyles, Lawrence Konner & Mark Rosenthal)

Wahlberg plays Captain Leo Davidson, an American astronaut who lands on a planet ruled by apes that talk and exhibit other human qualities. After Captain Davidson bests one of his ape adversaries, he exults with this spin-off of the proverbial saying Never send a boy to do a man’s job (discussed in the classic neverisms chapter).

Angelina Jolie, in her first major film role in Hackers (1995), offered another variation on the same proverb. In the role of computer hacker Kate “Acid Burn” Libby, she says:

Never send a boy to do a woman’s job.

Other films, and one television Christmas Special, have also tweaked the famous saying:

Never send a man to do a cat’s job.GARFIELD, in A Garfield Christmas Special (1987)

Never send an adult to do a kid’s job.ALEXA VEGA, as Carmen Cortez, in Spy Kids (2001)

Never send a human to do a machine’s job.HUGO WEAVING, as Agent Smith, in The Matrix (1999)

I’ve always had two principles throughout all my life in motion- pictures:

never do before the camera what you would not do at home

and never do at home what you would not do before the camera.EVELYN WAUGH

These words come from a fictional character—the aging English actor Sir Ambrose Abercrombie—in Waugh’s 1948 satirical novel The Loved One: An Anglo-American Tragedy (Waugh described it as “a little nightmare produced by the unaccustomed high living of a brief visit to Hollywood”).

Never insult anybody unintentionally.JOHN WAYNE, quoting his father

Wayne offered this in a 1971 Playboy interview. He added, “If I insult you, you can be goddam sure I intend to.” Wayne’s father may have been inspired by a popular line widely attributed to Oscar Wilde, but in fact authored by the American writer Oliver Herford: “A gentleman is one who never hurts anyone’s feelings unintentionally.”

Never burn bridges.

Today’s junior prick, tomorrow’s senior partner.SIGOURNEY WEAVER, to Melanie Griffith,

in Mike Nichols’s 1988 film Working Girl

(screenplay by Kevin Wade)

In the film, Katherine Parker (Weaver) is a high-class but hard-boiled, female executive who has recently hired the hardworking but unsophisticated Tess McGill (Griffith) as her secretary. In an early scene, McGill observes Parker’s cordial interaction with an obnoxious male colleague. As the man walks away, Parker says, “Ugh! What a slob!” McGill, impressed with how her boss handled the interaction, says, “You were so smooth with him.” The cynical Parker then replies with her never burn bridges comment.

sixteen

Never Answer an Anonymous Letter

Oxymoronic & Paradoxical Neverisms

The American actor Paul Muni retired in 1959, shortly after receiving an Oscar nomination for his performance in The Last Angry Man. Muni was one of the most respected actors of his generation. In his very first film, The Valiant (1929), he was nominated for a Best Actor Academy Award for his role as a prisoner preparing to be executed. After his performances in two 1932 films—Scarface and I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang—he was described by the publicists at Warner Brothers as “The screen’s greatest actor.” He starred in only two dozen films in his career, but received six Best Oscar nominations (winning one, for his performance in the 1935 film The Story of Louis Pasteur). Muni is only one of six actors to receive an Oscar nomination for his first and last screen appearances.

Named Meshilem Meier Weisenfreund at birth, Muni was seven years of age when he emigrated from Poland to America with his parents. His mother and father were both actors in the Yiddish theater, and it was only natural that their son would seek a show-business career. He made his stage debut as an actor at age twelve under the stage name Moony Weisenfreund. Several years later, he was performing as a juggler with the Yiddish Art Theatre when he got some life-changing advice from another juggler, a man named W. C. Fields:

You’ll never make it as a juggler, m’boy.

Your eyes are too sad. But don’t listen to me, kid.

My entire success is based on one rule: