Original Storytelling Quotes

Writing your own story around the same ideas is not plagiarism; at worst, it's being unoriginal.

When I work on my own stuff - and I think this is true for anybody - but when you work on something that you just completely own, you are trying to stay as true to your own storytelling voice as you can.

Sarah Cornwell has a brilliant eye for the telling detail, and a wonderfully original way of embodying family history. I was captivated by her memorable characters and the perfectly paced revelations of their surprising relationships.

I think it is more important to tell a story rather than follow any trend; that is a less bold way to go. If you do that [follow trends] you are just trying to ride on the coat tails of someone else's success.

It's exciting to originate Jessica Jones. There's obviously more freedom in that versus playing a well known character.

I think that the difference between 'The Sopranos' and the shows that came before it was that it was really personal. There had been a lot of dramas, a lot of really good ones, a lot of really bad ones, but they were always franchise shows about cops, or doctors, or lawyers. They weren't about the writer himself.

From time to time, there are people in the film industry who appear on the horizon with a unique vision. South African director Neill Blomkamp is one of those rare people.

I like it when a script shows you something new, and you can learn something through the journey of a film rather than being told things you already know.

It's hard to reinvent the wheel with a cop show. But 'Rookie Blue' has a pure emotional center that's not cynical.

The challenge for me is still to do something that hasn't been beaten into the movie going consciousness. Otherwise what am I in it for?

I would be perfectly happy doing an indie film that had some really cool creative ideas.

To find a script that works with provocative ideas is hard to find.

I praise CBS for taking a risk, which is always the price you pay for opportunity. This is not standard movie of the week storytelling. I think movies of the week have fallen into a niche and that isn't my niche.

I'm always looking for a fresh perspective because it's fun to tell stories that are original and new in some way.

I didn't have a list of things I should do this year, next year, find a good novel, sign two stars and make a deal - because I think cinema should come from cinema. I never adapted anything. Beautiful books are beautiful books, that's it. I don't know why we should transform them.

Dr. Seuss provided "ingenious and uniquely witty solutions to the standing problem of the juvenile fantasy writer: how to find, not another Alice, but another rabbit hole.

It might be more difficult because you haven't got a book or a prop, but for the most part I like to write unpaid... initially and my own stories.

Most of the best writing, the most creative writing, the most interesting, the most out-of-the-box kind of stuff, is being done on cable, you know, and on the computer. I mean, whatever it is, Amazon or Netflix or something. Because they're just willing to take chances, you know, and there's a market for it.

For a while we were chasing a book by Graham Greene to do Brighton Rock as a musical. We didn't get the rights, so we decided to create something from scratch, with Jonathan. By that time we were big fans of his work.

One of the reasons I love making movies is because it's an opportunity to share with the world a different way of being or a different way of living or seeing the world. If it's something you've already seen before, if I have too many reference points for it, then it's not exciting for me to make.

I don't know if the '80s were unique, but we certainly got original, groundbreaking stuff at the time with movies like 'Back to the Future' and 'Star Wars' - movies that became classics.

If we're talking about the science fiction or action genres, I've always tried when I could to do them in a way that's not just cookie-cutter - that they bring something fresh or original to it, have some kind of ideas to it. I've been fortunate, in some sense, to do those kinds of movies that are unique.

It was the last generation of writers [ the Cheers] that had grown up reading books instead of watching TV. So you weren't getting anything that was derivative of I Love Lucy or Happy Days. You were getting real characters [like those] they read in P.G. Wodehouse or Dickens or somewhere along the line, because they had all grown up with a love of literature.

My goal is to make a movie that no one would sort of expect me to make.

I want to write from my own experience.