Daily Inspiration Quote by Trevor Nunn

“Pretty fortunate” lands as both gratitude and a quiet indictment. Trevor Nunn is talking about commercial theater, a world where money isn’t just a budget line but a pressure system: investors want recognizable titles, marketable stars, and a show that can run, not just matter. By framing his creative freedom as luck, Nunn implies it’s not the default. Artistic integrity in that ecosystem is something you’re granted, negotiated, protected - or compromised.

The phrasing “allowed me to define” is doing a lot of work. Nunn isn’t claiming total autonomy; he’s describing a partnership where power ultimately sits with producers, the people who can say yes, say no, or say “make it shorter and funnier.” He’s also subtly repositioning the director’s role: not merely staging and polishing, but setting the ethical and aesthetic boundaries of the project. “Artistic limits” is especially revealing. It acknowledges that every production has constraints, but insists those constraints should be artist-led rather than imposed by marketing logic.

Context matters: Nunn emerged as a director who moved fluidly between subsidized institutions (like the Royal Shakespeare Company) and high-stakes commercial hits (Cats, Les Miserables). That career path makes him a credible translator between two theater dialects: art as mission, art as product. The subtext is a defense of the commercial stage as a site where seriousness can survive - but only if the people holding the purse strings respect the people holding the vision.