A bad review is like baking a cake with all the best ingredients and having someone sit on it.
The only thing worse than a bad review from the Ayatollah Khomeini would be a good review from the Ayatollah Khomeini.
From my close observation of writers... they fall into two groups: 1) those who bleed copiously and visibly at any bad review, and 2) those who bleed copiously and secretly at any bad review.
In my game, you get brokenhearted a bit. You do a play, get a bad review in the papers... actors are sensitive; you think of all the work you've done, and it breaks your heart, but you learn to shrug it off and to carry on.
I wish I could be like Shaw who once read a bad review of one of his plays, called the critic and said: 'I have your review in front of me and soon it will be behind me.'
I can't stay mad very long. I get grumpy when I read a bad review. I say, 'How could he say that about my music?' Then I forget about it. If I got mad every time somebody wrote something negative about me, I'd be exploding all the time. I'd be burned out just from reading reviews.
If I get a bad review, I don't take it personally because everyone is entitled to their opinion.
Nothing ruins your day more than getting a bad review.
Praise and criticism seem to me to operate exactly on the same level. If you get a great review, it's really thrilling for about ten minutes. If you get a bad review, it's really crushing for ten minutes. Either way, you go on.
You still get these waves of doubt that come over you, for example, when you get a bad review or you accept a part and think, 'Oh, God, what have I just accepted? I can't do that.' I don't think that's something that will ever go away in me.