J. J. Abrams Quotes

People have always said since TV was invented what a cultural wasteland it is but I think it is the worst and the best. It is the golden age of television.

Television is not hurting. Television is in fantastic shape. It's just a golden age for other people.

The displacement of scripted series by reality programming continues to be a severe obstacle to a working actor's ability to earn a living.

TV is sort of the only way to go for an actress my age to make a decent salary; with independent films, you just can't.

I think the fact that I grew up in show business had a real effect on my personality. If you were born in New York during the golden age of television, and you grew up on Broadway, that marks you.

Cable TV has become where the best actors, writers and directors have gone to work because they are allowed to do character-driven stories.

Many people have been able to get pitch meetings by just cold calling, especially the smaller networks and especially with the reality shows.

When you're just starting out in the TV business, you don't know anything at all, and you think you're doing a better job than everyone else around you, and you just sort of presume that you're not getting the credit you deserve. And then when you start to get better, the pressure is extraordinary, and then you start to second-guess everything you do, and when people start looking to you for answers, for insight and for analysis and guidance, you start to wonder if you are the right person - even when you have all the information.

At network television you could make a show like Freaks and Geeks, and even though 7 million people watch is every week, you were considered a terrible failure, and they got rid of you and staff. Now ... It's like a world where the replacements are the biggest fans in the world. It's, the Elvis Costellos of television are the winners. Creativity is king and it's very very exciting.

I think it's all independent films. There aren't any! If they were looking for me when I was making Polyester, then it'd be perfect, but they're not. I'm not looking for that. TV is much bigger and better now; far more people see it.

Working in television is very hard. I think people know that.

I feel like it's a golden age for television.

I think they [TV productions] were just kind of drying up. I'd done a couple of episodes, but nothing was happening. So I went to Vancouver to visit a buddy and see what was going on, and that year was crazy. Vancouver was on fire at that point. It was all these Stephen J. Cannell productions - The Commish being one of them - and in one I was a bartender, and I think I had five lines.

As a matter of fact - it'll probably ruin my movie career - but I think better storytellers are in television.

We're in the second golden age of television, and to me, one of the most profound things that's happening in TV is just that by default that opened the door to more women, more people of color, more outliers. It's one of the greatest side effects of the digital revolution.

I'm a lot happier in people's living rooms weekly than I think I would be if I was really, really relying on a movie career to keep me fulfilled and excited.

I think the reason the Golden Age of television is so golden is because a lot of folks are willing to let creators do their thing and live or die by their own muse. They certainly allow us to do that.

Seeing movie people trying to get into TV now who don't understand that is very interesting.

A lot of things that people think are risky, I don't think are risky. I don't get all that. I think what was really risky for network television was to let cable television to take the summers.

Being in TV is insane. The notes you get sometimes, I just don't understand them.

I don't think the entertainment business in general will ever just be okay with how people are. I think we're in a business that critiques everything we do, and you kind of just take it with a grain of salt. I look at my grandmother, and I think she's aged beautifully, so I hope that I could be a smidgen of how she's aged. There's nothing you can do. All you can do is take of yourself and do the things that make you feel good and make you healthy and age appropriately, but there's always going to be people out there are going to say something, and there's nothing you can do about it.

I think there's definitely much more opportunities for women now to find a role in 30s and 40s both. I think you're starting to find people really seeing that - here's the thing. It's hard for me to say and know the experience how it was ten, twenty years ago because I was only in my teens and my 20s, but I know from watching TV myself and watching film myself I see a lot more 30s and 40s on screen, which just makes me very, very happy. It's what we should be watching.

The good thing is that I really think that American television is in kind of a second golden age. Even though there's a lot of reality and all those contest shows, which aren't my kind of shows, the scripted stuff that's going on is so good right now because of basic cable. Everyone has stepped it up and realised that people like quality.

I've had it-the agencies, the winking, the networks, the ratings. Anyone who thinks TV is an art medium is crazy-it's an advertising medium.

I would definitely not rule out doing television, in the future, because I think it's a great medium for telling stories.