David Geffen

In my experience, there was never anything quite like the egos in CSNY.

We all die unhealed

I thought Laura’s record was going to be huge… It was not successful it sold something like 20 or 30,000 albums. Laura lacked a certain level of ambition and didn’t really want to do the things that people do to become known. So I thought I’d better get people to record these songs and make them hits so that people will see that she’s a great songwriter.

[In 1990 on the president of MCA calling and saying ‘We’re going to make you the biggest offer this company has ever made, and I’m going to send it to you by messenger right now.’] It’s 1990. Send me a fax.

I wasn’t looking to be gay. I was quite upset when I discovered that was part of my life. I wished it would go away. But you can’t change who you are. And I tried to fight it in the beginning. And then I had a cancer scare in the mid-70’s. And that turned out to be a mistake, and I thought, ‘Life is too short.’

I never thought that I would have a career in show business…

Television is the first truly democratic culture – the first culture available to everybody and entirely governed by what the people want. The most terrifying thing is what people do want.

The most important service rendered by the press and the magazines is that of educating people to approach printed matter with distrust.

You know, it really doesn’t matter what the media write as long as you’ve got a young, and beautiful, piece of ass.

Fake news is at an all time high. Where is their apology to me for all of the incorrect stories???

If you are a little different, or a little outrageous, or if you do things that are bold or controversial, the press is going to write about you.

I actually don’t read most of the coverage about Facebook. I try to learn from getting input from people who use our services directly more than from pundits.

My people keep telling me I shouldn’t write letters like this to critics. The way I see it, critics get to say what they want to about my work, so why shouldn’t I be able to say what I want to about theirs?

The point is that if you are a little different, or a little outrageous, or if you do things that are bold or controversial, the press is going to write about you.

I notice in some of the newspapers that they have taken a bit of an interest in me. According to one headline Jeremy Corbyn welcomed the prospect of an asteroid wiping out humanity. Asteroids are pretty controversial and it is not the kind of thing I would want to rule out… without a full debate at conference and a review so can we have the debate later in the week.

With the press there is no ‘off the record’.

There’s so much comedy on television. Does that cause comedy in the streets?

It seems not more reasonable to leave the right of printing unrestrained, because writers may be afterwards censured, than it would be to sleep with doors unbolted, because by our laws we can hang a thief.

We want someone to bring us the news.

Contrary to what a lot of people think, I don’t enjoy doing press. I’ve been asked the same questions a million times now, and I don’t particularly like talking about my personal life.

My Twitter has become so powerful that I can actually make my enemies tell the truth.