The Making of 'Amadeus' (2002 Video)

Milos Forman: Self

Quotes 

• Milos Forman : I remember it was the 4th of July. It's not a Bank Holiday there so we were working. We were filming the marriage of Figaro, the camera was behind the stage looking out over the dancers and the audience. So, "roll it", "play back" and instead of Mozart, American national anthem starts to play.

• Milos Forman : All stood up, except 30 or 40 men and women, looking at each other, panic on their faces, what they should do? That was the secret police interspersed among the crowd.

• Milos Forman : You know in communist countries they love to make movies about composers because composers don't talk, they make music they don't say anything subversive.

• Milos Forman : I talked to Neville Marriner after the première and he said

  [about Tom Hulce] 

  Milos Forman : he never hit a wrong key. Even when he plays backwards.

• Milos Forman : This movie could have been shot in only three cities, Vienna, Budapest or Prague because only these three cities have the 18th century architecture. Prague was ideal, Prague was absolutely ideal because thanks to communist inefficiency the 18th century was untouched.

• Milos Forman : I was reading F. Murray Abraham for a small part, and he was OK. Then I had a young actor coming for Mozart so I said, "Could you just read Salieri for this young man" and F. Murray, probably because it didn't matter, gave a wonderful performance.

• Milos Forman : [about Peter Schaefer]  We had big conflict, big conflict. I hated his cooking, he hated my cooking.

• Milos Forman : In the theater, everything is stylized. No-one pretends that the tree is a real tree or the sunset is a real sunset.

• Milos Forman : Although I love Meg Tilley, I think Elizabeth Berridge was more right, I mean Constanze was a landlady's daughter, she was a street kid.

• Milos Forman : The second and third floors were the secret archives of the secret police.

• Milos Forman : So after a few weeks I told F. Murray, ok you got the part. He obviously didn't believe me because he immediately took a role in another film.