Justine Bateman Quotes

One day I had an idea for a movie. Everything came after that.

I'm not a Larry David. I don't have a 'Curb Your Enthusiasm' and a 'Seinfeld' in me.

If I write a cop show, it's not up to me to decide how different it is from 'Law & Order.' I had screenwriters go on and on and on about how their cop show isn't like any other cop show on TV. They made very good points, and it absolutely doesn't matter. It's entirely up to the audience to decide.

As a director, you try to find what is creative.

The individual - man as a man, man as a brain, if you like - interests me more than what he makes because I've noticed that most artists only repeat themselves.

Despite all of our technological advances, content creation still requires time, inspiration, and a certain amount of sweat. There aren't any shortcuts. You can't write an algorithm for it. You can't predict it. You can't code it.

I really love 'Dexter.' I'd like to be on 'Curb Your Enthusiasm' or 'Breaking Bad.'

Sitcoms, I always figured that would be an easy gig, but man, it is not.

When I go into making a movie, personally, I don't try to bring other pieces of movies with me.

When I was in school, I was always writing scripts and dressing up as characters. I'd constantly be that guy who'd get up on stage. I used to write imaginary TV shows, like soap operas, for fun.

The same issue is happening on a show like Everybody Loves Raymond now, which is in its eighth year and struggling to come up with good stories. It'll be interesting to see how they do. The bottom line is, it starts with the writers and ends with the writers.

The director in TV and the writer and the creator are working very much hand in hand.

When you are pushing yourself to not go back to the same well, you're gonna come up with something different, or you'll find songs that are different.

I'm not sitting around thinking of ideas for TV shows.

The strangest thing about writing a sitcom, is never knowing if it will become anything but words on a page.

I think the idea of creating a character from scratch, one that has not been done in a novel or an existing story, is immensely exciting, terrifying and ultimately rewarding.

The whole thing of doing a TV series, I find it very daunting not knowing where the story's going.

I like to do things that I develop from the ground up.

My approach to 'Star Trek' was, 'I know science fiction, and I know screen writing.' That was very arrogant of me, but you really need to be a little bit arrogant to think that what you have to say is good enough to justify the expense of hundreds of thousands - now millions of dollars - to make an episode of the TV show.

Possessing a healthy imagination is a necessary ingredient for creativity.

If you're on a network show, it's either some wacky sitcom or a drama where you're servicing a procedure.

I really strive to bring something new to each book. I don't want to write the same book over and over again.

It's very common for people to recommend something to me because they're going on what I've already written, when, what really is the case, is that you want to write about something you haven't written about, in ways that you haven't done before.

If the novelist isn't surprised by where his book ends up, he or she probably hasn't written anything worth remembering.

Every time I write a new book, I want to push myself to try something different.