Noah Hawley Quotes

That's why, when Alias came along, I knew I'd be OK if the show was on for five or six years because the writing was so good and the creative team was so strong.

I don't think any of us could have possibly anticipated how successful Mad Men has been. When we were working on the pilot, we loved it. We thought it was special. We hoped and prayed it'd be a success. But, we didn't count on it.

That's the holy grail as a TV writer, to work on a story that you care about and to put it out there and for it to find the audience and connect with fans and connect with critics.

Before 'Entourage,' I couldn't get a sitcom.

I've done, like, eight pilots, and every time, everyone thinks it's going to go for 10 years.

You hope for that with anything, but with a TV show, the writer and the actor being the right mix are more important than the actual writing of the pilot because you hope it's something that can have a long life.

It's hard to be a breakout show and stay on top. We're like the flagship show over here.

Which, of course, isn't the point of writing - but it would be nice if, along with the creative satisfaction of writing and seeing my work in print, I could do more than merely scrape a living. Okay, moaning over.

I had no idea 'L.A. Law' would be so mega. I knew it was a big show, but I was just one actress in a group of many good, award-winning actresses.

You want to strike that happy medium: the balance of being able to find creative satisfaction in your profession, be able to afford a roof over your head, but still have the freedom to live a relatively normal life.

It's hard to make a living as a novelist. My first novel 'Tapping the Source' made quite a splash in Hollywood, and people started asking if I wanted to write scripts. I quickly realized I could make a lot more money that way.

A successful television series can chain you to a schedule of long hours and can put your personal life on hold. But after it is all over, if you survive, then anything is possible.

Writing books and being paid for it - it's not like winning the Lottery. You can't suddenly go, 'Yippee!' and start throwing tenners in the air. I've done pretty well out of it, but certainly not enough to say, 'Right, that's me set up for life.'

The comforts come from my movie and television writing. It is unusual to live this well simply from books.

I think the death knell for any musician is getting a job that you like and pays enough that you just stay there forever.

TV is the place that writers want to be.

As actors, if you get a pilot on HBO or on USA, your odds are good that it's going to get picked up.

There were many years when I was hand-to-mouth and didn't know how I was gonna make rent. I've done every job under the sun, from busing tables, temping, and working in factories to SAT prep and detailing cars. So to be able to make a living where all I do is write is absolutely liberating.

As long as I'm able to actually maintain a career where I can write full-time, I'll be thrilled.

I don't really enjoy working in TV, to be completely honest. Even though it's incredibly lucrative, I'm just terrified of not being satiated in a myriad of different ways.

Before 'New Girl,' I had just been grinding in TV for a really long time. I had been testing for so many shows and not getting them. You don't know how difficult it is or how lucky you have to be - and I only say lucky because there are so many people out there - to get a show on the air and keep it going.

TV is designed to keep characters in place for years on end. The best example is 'M*A*S*H:' You have a three-year police action in Korea, and they stretched that out to eleven seasons. It was a great show, but when you think about it, a weird unreality overtakes a television series. You see the actors age, and yet the characters don't.

There are not that many people who can say they have been on a show long enough to leave it. Usually, you don't have a choice. The show gets canceled. There are very few people who live in the rare air of being able to leave a show while it is still in production.

I had been trying to make movies, but they were really hard to get made. TV wound up, by surprise, a much more fulfilling place to work. That said, I've always been drawn to make movies.

The only reason to do a television series is to make it successful. And if it is successful, that's a six or seven year commitment.