Steven Knight Quotes

I really have to feel a sense of freedom in my storytelling.

We've been working with the very best in the business. The studio really just let us alone to make the films.

I don't want to be owned by a corporation and obliged to make a certain type of album. I want to be free.

I don't tell anyone how to write and no one tells me.

And I'm the kind of manager that doesn't believe that you micro-manage professionals. They should understand their responsibility and carry out those responsibility.

I've been so spoiled in the theater, writing plays where I can just do exactly what I want and nobody messes with me.

HBO is really famous for hiring good people and staying out of their way until they ask for help, or need it. And that reputation is earned.

I worked with Steven Spielberg on Amistad... he seemed so very secure in himself that he let me do things.

I have achieved what I wanted to achieve. I'm better off at some sort of independent place where they not only like what I produce but also trust me to be the one to produce it.

I enjoy total creative control right now. Nobody tells me to make it longer, shorter, better, sexier, more violent, whatever.

Sometimes directors will hire you and say, 'Oh, we love your work.' And then they start to tell you how to do it. I say, 'Hey, man, back off. You hired me to do it. Let me do it.'

Leaving Def Jam was kind of a blessing in disguise because we can make whatever record we want.

It's really nice to be able to do what I'm doing without having to compromise with another musician.

Directors tend to kind of let me do what I want to do.

I can really write what I want. I can take time; I can do nothing for a year. That is paradise.

When you DJ, you're just on your own, which is nice because there's no argument.

I definitely enjoy working with people who can do their thing but also allow me to do my thing, you know? Who respect the process.

Netflix really trusts us. We don't get a lot of network notes. They're not coming back all the time like, 'Oh, this is too sad,' or 'This is too weird.'

I had a lot more creative freedom back in the day.

For a long time I was free. I didn't belong to any type of studio, or any company. I kept a sort of freedom and a light touch.

I need to have a great deal of control and the ability to share my control with my collaborators and grant them the freedom and the quality of work I think these people deserve. If I don't have those elements, I walk away.

I couldn't be an artist who was told what to do, what to be, what to sing.

I would design for anybody who gives me a free hand and who doesn't sit on my head.

I think it seems to be when I'm trusted, and someone just lets me have free rein - 'Do what you want, man' - that kind of confidence that directors instil in me always gets my best stuff out.

When, no matter what you do, everybody's going to punch holes in it, then you just go and you do what you want. And that's the most freeing place to be.