Writing for Television Quotes

I really have no plans for any kind of career in TV or anything, but if I wanted to become good at it, I could. But I don't really think it's in the cards.

I always felt that it was easier to take a funny person and teach them to write television than to take somebody who was a television writer and make them funny. And I discovered a lot of great writers that went on to do a lot of great shows like 'Seinfeld,' 'Friends,' you know, 'Three and a Half Men.'

I'm sure that people who have been tweeting funny things have ended up on writing staffs of a late night show.

I was a novelist first. But in the mid-'80s, I did work in television for ten years. And yes, that was frequently the reaction to my scripts. People would say, 'You know, George, this is great. We love it, a terrific script, but it would cost five times our budget to shoot this.'

Working as a showrunner has made it tougher to watch other shows and movies.

When I was really young I didn't know that there was such a thing as a screenwriter. I wrote stories.

Every day, I learn something new. I think one of the most exciting things for a writer is to work on a TV show. It's like a novel. You have a really long time to develop and learn about the characters, and you can just really keep digging in deeper, every week.

I've had a pilot every single year that didn't sell for the past four years, that'll smack you in the back of the head. I had a really good one last year; I wouldn't have done the play in New York if I had gotten that one.

The muscles that writers need for film are very different from TV muscles. Now, when I hire the writers and put the writers' room together, I know where their muscles need to be.

If I were actually Homer Simpson, I'd be getting scripts out the wazoo.

Being a showrunner meant writing and producing a television show, period, but with 'Lost,' suddenly it became part of the job to promote and be the face of the brand. In a weird way, the story was as much the star as any of the actors, so people wanted to hear from us.

I was a writer on '30 Rock' for six years.

My first novel, 'You Must be Sisters,' was started in Pakistan. I've wrote several novels and a TV drama set or partly-set there.

I've always been a writer, I've always been a storyteller, but I never thought about screenwriting.

I've done a lot of work in Hollywood and theatre, but to be honest, the biggest pleasure I've ever got is from the TV single plays I've written. It's a format where you don't mind saying, 'I want to tackle some important themes head on.'

I didn't audition for 'SNL.' I sent in a tape to 'SNL' the year before I started writing there, but I got the job there through doing stand-up on Fallon.

I was doing two things at once for quite a long time. I was working in television and writing novels.

I always felt that it was easier to take a funny person and teach them to write television than to take somebody who was a television writer and make them funny.

Sitcoms, I always figured that would be an easy gig, but man, it is not.

Television is making, there was in independent film renaissance late '80s through the mid-90's. It was an amazing time. Television is doing that right now. So that's why everybody wants to do it. I mean if you're writing stuff like, you know, Fargo, or True Detective, or any of these things that are on, Breaking Bad, there are no rules in television.

'The Dick Van Dyke Show' was my labor of love. When asked the best thing I ever did - that was it. I wrote it originally for myself.

I wanted to do screenwriting. That's what I went to school for, but my major was overfilled, and when I got 'The Daily Show', I was a semester away from officially starting my major, so I never started that in particular.

Shortly after I finished chemo, but during my 12 weeks of radiation, Lennon and I returned to work on the third season of the show we write, produce and star in, 'Playing House.'

For a writer, working in television is an incredibly rewarding medium. You're in charge of all aspects of production and get to see your vision come to life every week.

TV is a writer's medium, the writer is in charge effectively. So what you write is what gets shot, so in that sense I prefer it. But in terms of the scale of it, features are fantastic.