Nicholson Baker Quotes

I think it's touching that the fans feel so close to the characters that they feel personally hurt. I've felt that way in plenty of TV shows - 'Game of Thrones,' 'Mad Men.' How could they do that to that character? That's drama.

If you care about [the characters] as if they were real, that always helps.

The best writers are gravitating to that world. What's rewarding also is this: you have a two hour movie, you can't really delve into character that much. In a TV show you can. You can delve into character. You can get into nitty gritty.

Nowadays, kids know how a programme like Merlin is made and how it works. But the show just seems to grow in popularity the more it goes on.

The thing with film and theater is that you always know the story so you can play certain cues in each scene with the knowledge that you know where the story's going to end and how it's going to go. But on television nobody knows what's going to happen, even the writers.

If you create a good story that has a lot of story value... I think audiences like that. It's why they stick with the same TV show over and over.

One of the benefits to television is that you're with these characters for years, you know them so well.

I think the tricky balance, the most important thing more than the horror is to have a compelling story, compelling drama, a show about great characters that you care about and you want to come back every week to see what they're up to.

Even in horror novels where you know most characters aren't going to make it to the end, it's crucial to have fully fleshed-out characters. If you don't do that, the reader doesn't care what happens to them.

I've never been on a TV show for more than a season and you have to continually keep it interesting and you have to keep it connected, even as you change.

In drama, I think, the audience is a willing participant. It's suspending a certain kind of disbelief to try to get something out of a story.

On TV, you never know where it's going. They may even lie to you about where it's going. You never really know because the scripts come in every couple of weeks or so.

There are so few shows that are willing to take risks with their characters in the way that 'Homeland' does. And yet, the audience still comes back and loves those characters.

What really motivates you to try to work things out as an actor is in large part fear, because you want to get into that narrative and bring the audience along.

The idea of viewers getting invested in a series is that you're getting invested in the reality of these characters' lives that, in fact, don't have an ending.

The film depends on the audience's belief in this relationship.

There are a lot of shows that have secrets and string people along and use the secrets of the narrative engine to keep people coming back every week. I don't know if those programs even have an answer. I don't know how they build their shows.

What I find frustrating about scripted television is that it's rare that you are surprised by how you feel about the character, or how you feel about the show.

I think people are getting into these 'Empire' songs because of the emotional investment they have in the characters. You kind of feel like you know the songs already because you just watched them play out in front of you with these characters.

Sometimes when you're inside a story, it's almost better if you don't think too much about its wider cultural significance or if you don't think about how audiences might react to it. That takes you out of the reality of the situation you're committing to as you're telling the story.

In film and theater, you know the story and the journey from beginning to end, but with TV, you can keep peeling away layers and exploring a new world each week.

We figured the audience would want good stories, great art, wonderful characters, people you could fall in love with that we would immediately put through hell.

I think television is about the characters you want to see again, and so you want to invite these people into your home. And certainly, seeing them get into bad situations and then watching them have to get themselves out, that's always super satisfying.

People love storylines. They love them because at some point, the talent will get people emotionally invested.

So often, I think shows get into these grooves where they know the characters hit, and they just write for it over and over and over again.