Charles Dance Quotes

I don't usually watch a lot of TV, but 'Mad Men' changed my perspective. I admire Matthew Weiner who came up with the idea and wrote such a great TV series, and the broadcasting company for being bold enough to air such a series.

When it comes to storytelling, not taking risks is riskier than swinging for the fences. I have very simple ambitions when it comes to taking risks in storytelling and programming. I try very hard to avoid the expected.

My theory is, independent movies only work if you're willing to push the material and do something different.

Always changing genres, making very different films is a good idea. It's a way of making yourself feel vulnerable again, getting back to that innocence. As is working within a circumspect budget.

When I brought 'Sex and the City' to HBO, I wanted to do something independent, where I could be like, 'I don't care if anybody watches this thing. Just let me do something that I would love to see.' Honestly, the success of 'Sex and the City' was what was most surprising to me. It was sort of like the anti-TV-show in my mind.

I don't have a fear factor. Well, not much of one. And I'm willing to risk quite a lot - as a comedian, you're always risking a lot. You're risking failure, especially if you're improvising and going on TV shows trying to make comedy out of thin air. That is quite a risky business.

I think that if you've got 5 million people that enjoy drama and invest in characters, you must take the time to not worry about your job and getting sacked and just go for it and hit it again.

My standards are based on shows I like, like 'Girls' or 'Arrested Development.' And they're all shows that are groundbreaking. I guess in the back of my head, I think, If you're not being groundbreaking, then what are you doing? If you're not being ballsy and honest and vulgar, then what are you doing?

Television is to news as a bumper sticker is to Shakespeare.

I knew David Lynch going to television was going to be something. It was either going to not work, nobody was going to get it and it would disappear, or it was going to be something special and really stand out.

The thing I'm most proud of about - not all of our movies, but a lot of our movies - is that you might love 'em, you might hate 'em, but most of the time, they're trying to be different or trying new things, which I think is really important.

Jimmy McGovern - I love his writing, and I'm a big fan of him and Alan Clarke.

I would love to work on another installment of 'Gilmore Girls.'

Chaos is good for CNN.

I don't know why people feel popular actors avoid doing mytho shows. Aren't they also doing good? Sometimes such shows give you more fame.

All I know is Andrew Davies is an amazing writer; I adore the scripts. I think that Jeremy Piven is outstanding.

When you think 'Peaky Blinders,' when it first began it got mixed reviews and people didn't know what to do with it, and it was like: 'Why is there modern music on this?' So I think whenever you do something different you're going to get that response.

'Eagle vs Shark' is a little film I could take risks with and make mistakes on.

Every single television product has the ambition to chase ratings, every one of them. Many have other ambitions, for many, ratings are not #1. But my experience on TV, and on the entertainment side, has been entirely ratings-based. When I look at TV I look at ratings. And I never second guess ratings. Never.

If you're making a smaller movie, you're almost obligated to do something unexpected and surprising.

I am lucky that I am surviving in the industry despite the kind of films I have made, which are absolutely unconventional.

There's no real theatre without taking risks.

I wouldn't be interested in [nowadays] television simply because I think it goes too fast. Except if something was maybe a play on television or some great television script.

I was doing an hour drama on television and a Jackie Chan movie in Toronto, so I was on a plane every three days.

We're in a very competitive industry, and sometimes the bigger Hollywood things are not so risk takey. I find myself mostly existing in this weirdo indie world, which I feel really comfortable being in. The thing that motivates me the most is to try to do something way different than the last thing that I did.