Mitchell Hurwitz Quotes

I've been on one TV series after another. None of the network decisions have ever made sense to me.

Most of the TV shows I've done have all been in the U.S.

It's funny: All my friends back home are always wondering why every television show I'm on is a drama, but all the comedy pilots I did died a slow and painful death.

I'm pretty lucky to work on both 'CSI: NY' and 'Supernatural.' Not bad gigs!

Any actor will tell you there's more of a schedule to doing a television show. That's why you'll notice a lot of big movie actors are doing television, and they'll tell you, it's because of the schedule.

The lifespan of any show is to end in cancellation.

I've sold shows based on my standup twice to CBS, but they've never gone past the script stage. TV is very competitive.

I love TV and am happy doing TV shows.

My experience in TV is that it takes time for shows to find their way.

In the era of networks only, I cannot tell you the number of shows that we don't know about that did not survive. They got canceled. But there are a few that survived by accident, because they didn't have anything else to do, and they stayed with it.

To understand this whole area, you have to stop thinking like a viewer and start thinking like a network programming exec.

I grew up with television. I love television and to be working in it is awesome. I think where I do well at television is because I grew up watching the great sitcom actors Jackie Gleason, I love Rob Reiner, also John Ritter.

The worst thing you can do is end up with a network show on cable or end up with a cable show on network.

To me, television is one of the most exciting things going on right now, as far as content goes. Some of these shows that are on television are better than any of the movies out there.

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.

I had a TV show called 'The Apprentice' and it's one of the most successful reality shows in the history of television. And now I'm doing something else.

I am of the opinion that there is more high-quality television being produced than at any time in the history of television.

American television really is pathetic.

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

Television is just amazing - how many people see it and how many people recognize you, and I think once you've had the opportunity and have been in front of the public, it's very flattering to have people come up and say hello to you. It's a tremendous industry. I've been in places where people come out of the woodwork. And you would never think - small towns in France or traveling through Europe - and there are so many of those people there that recognize you, and you've been in their homes. I find it to be a very flattering thing.

Television. That's where movies go when they die.

I've really dreamed of doing television. All of us do television, coming up. But when I was coming up, television was a black hole for actors. Now, television has a certain cache. Now everybody wants to be on TV because they're doing adult dramas. If you're an actor, it's like, "Well, get me on television," because it's the only place you can do it and also make a living at it. If my kids need shoes, I better do a TV show because I damn sure don't make any money with independent films.

I started on television, and on sitcoms, and loved them, but then they sort of seemed to be going through sort of an ice age, and they started dying off one by one, and I recognized that, and my representatives recognized that, and we said 'Well, let's look at dramas and other things like that.'

Television is for appearing on, not looking at.

We've been playing a lot with television. We have some shows set up and then some new shows that are about to be set up. That's gonna be kind of a fun thing for us as producers.