Mara Brock Akil Quotes

I love writing for women. The willingness to go from laughter to tears in a moment is the greatest palette you can paint with as a writer.

I'd love to do a movie with females in it, and not necessarily the female version of 'The Hangover,' but I'd love to. If I did it it'd star Juliette Lewis, because she's the funniest woman in the world. She's my favorite actress on the planet. If we did a character-based comedy about women, I don't see it out of my range.

When I think about the shows that we have on our air, we've been known for a long time for shows that feature strong, dynamic, powerful women at their forefront. And we're going to continue with that kind of storytelling.

I think often times on Joss Whedon's shows he can make you hate a character for a period and then love the character. He does it effortlessly.

I want to do a little bit of everything. I love sci-fi. I think it's more the characters that draw me towards things. I like strong women. I'm very interested in futuristic stuff, anything.

I've never been passionate about just music, I've never seen myself going into music in that sense. My love for music has always been connected to the stories told through music, which is why I was drawn to theater and why I think 'Glee' is so powerful.

I love the idea of animation just because it removes the actor from the character, and you can be anything. I've been devouring 'Adventure Time' and 'Archer.' I'd love to get my hands dirty on either of those shows.

Acting and writing go together. Actors write because they love words and becoming other people - we love to escape into other characters.

I actually thought 'Desperate Housewives' finished very well. I just think there's still stories to be told. I feel like I get that from fans that they weren't done watching those people's lives.

What I love about 'Mockingjay, Part 1' is that President Coin or Cressida could have easily been played by a man, and if you look at 'Interstellar,' the Anne Hathaway or Jessica Chastain roles would have been men years ago.

I, as a fan of numerous TV shows and movies, know that people mess up. The characters that we love are not always going to act in the ways that we want them to. That's what makes them interesting.

One of the things that's important for anybody adapting source material that is primarily a male buddy picture is to find ways to latch on to strong female characters in the piece and bring them to the forefront and celebrate their point of view alongside the men; otherwise, it becomes a sausage party, and it's a singular point of view.

I won't take parts where the female character has no substance.

In an ideal world, I'd love to work on something that is on par with 'Lost' or better than 'Lost.'

I think women have such rich emotional lives that they are expressive about. I also think they're funny. I like watching strong female characters, and I like writing them. I don't know if it's conscious that I gravitate towards women, but it's certainly evolved that way.

I love 'Game of Thrones' and 'Breaking Bad.'

I really like getting inside the heads of female characters. I think I can do that well, and I enjoy it.

I think 'Caprica' is a little out of left field, which is kind of what I love about it. It's a little different. The first couple of episodes are really about wrapping your head around this world. I love 'Grey's Anatomy,' but I think it's the same kind of concept: You just get lost in this world, and you believe what they're setting up.

I'm totally into Taylor Swift. I think she has super-clever lyrics, and I love that she writes her own music. Some of the themes she writes about are stuff I wish was there for me when I was in high school, and I'm so happy she really cares about her female fans. She's not catering to a male audience and is writing music for other girls.

I love comedy, but I actually do prefer drama because I am already animated as a human being.

When you cast someone like Natalie Portman, the character can't just be the love interest.

The best part of my job is that we can be making shows like 'Boardwalk', 'Thrones', 'True Blood' but also female-centered comedies like 'Enlightened', 'Veep' and 'Girls'.

'Girls' is one of my favorite shows of all time. One of the things I love about Lena Dunham and Jenji Kohan and Shonda Rhimes is that they're all willing to show complex, amazing women.

I think films about men are often about characters who don't want to express their feelings. You're supposed to kind of admire them for not expressing their feelings. And I feel that's a bit dull. Women's stories often have stronger emotional content, which I enjoy doing. What I really love doing is mixing that with humor.

I love complex characters - strong females who are vulnerable but have a life and soul. That's what I'm drawn to and what I enjoy most.