I don't want to see trickle down racism. I don't want to see a president of the United States saying things which change the character of the generations of Americans that are following. Presidents have an impact on the nature of our nature. And trickle down racism, trickle down bigotry, and trickle down misogyny, all these extraordinarily dangerous to the heart and character of America.
One of the great things about TV is the story to tell can be very internal and really character-based.
Character is what someone does, much more than who they are. I can be sarcastic or I can be fearful, but it doesn't really matter until there's a story - until someone comes in and holds us hostage.
I think it actually makes more sense for a new audience than the old show did because we're focusing on one character at a time. It's all conjecture why somebody didn't watch, but one of the theories was that there was just so much information, even in the trailers and promos, of all these different people.
At the time, I used to say, "We should market this like Everybody Loves Raymond. It's just a guy dealing with his family." Instead, it was irresistible to show all these funny people. So, I actually think this could be more inviting to a new audience because they can just watch one character, find out what's going on in his life, and then meet another character and find out what's going on in her life, and then see how it intersects the other one.
I've never had a working relationship like I have with them. I developed a lot of the design of this show with them. That conversation was about, "What are your needs? What are you looking for? Will this work for you guys? Will a show work where you've got one episode per character?" They really were a creative partner.
I believe I am yet to dance my favorite role, but I am pretty open to adapting to different characters. I would love to be Odette in Swan Lake one day. I think that would be the ultimate role.
I find more of an authenticity in people who are a little strange - so I really like characters who are just the tiniest bit weird. I find enormous comfort in that - someone who's kind of normal just doesn't feel as true.
I really love being a character actor.
Helpful to me over the years was some of Ernest Hemingway's writing, for example A Farewell to Arms. You have characters who speak Italian or Spanish to each other. It's been helpful to me to study and try to emulate that in that way.
Not a specific song. What I do maybe love above all about Nick Cave is how he's created this universe, this world, where there are all these characters and songs and themes. It's very unique, and I appreciate it. It's very hard to say that I have a specific favourite; I just actually love everything that he does.
I think that's what makes David Ayer really interesting. He likes to make a tough-y movie, but actually he's a character director. He's fascinated by the actual people who decide to have these jobs and the way it affects their lives.
I like people to be surprised by the turn of events. I don't want things just to be pat and formulaic. If there's some sort of internal combustion in the character or a desire to change the way things are going, that makes for conflict, which is the essence of drama.
Narrative and characters have always interested me. I never tried to alienate an audience. Of course, gradually, I wanted a bigger and bigger space to draw people in, so it's very organic [growth].
I think because I write so many short stories, it's not that hard to come up with characters that are not me.
Writing a novel was like I had some Play-Doh to work with and could just keep working with it - doing a million drafts and things changing radically and characters appearing and disappearing and solving mysteries: Why is this thing here? Should I just take that away? And then realizing, no, that is there, in fact, because that is the key to this. I love that sort of detective work, keeping the faith alive until all the questions have been sleuthed out.
I really believe in the characters I play.
It doesn't help for you to name a character's first name be Mindy and then be like, "I'm nothing like the character."
We have this saying, and it's been very useful when a series, 'The Mindy Project' goes for longer than a hundred episodes, which is Mindy character can never get what she wants when she wants it. We enjoyed it because it felt very real to her character to make a big impulsive move and it seems like she has everything, this instant family, a guy she loves and then there's a moment of panic.
When you only do 10 episodes for a final season, every character and all of her interactions in every storyline have so much more import because it's the last time we're going to do it. It's been really helpful saying, "OK, where do we want each of these characters to end?" We have 10 episodes to do it and working backward from that, I kind of envy my friends who have always been on a cable network because this is really that great benefit of doing it this way.
It's weird: I was in a conference room, shouting out story ideas in the voices of different characters, and it was something I had to learn because I'd never been in that atmosphere. But I think I had a quick learning curve, because this is the job I was supposed to have.
People, you know, had trouble with the character. Mindy is not immediately likeable. She does and says a lot of things that you don't see in, forget female characters, any characters. Like, she says things like, "I'm going to hell because I don't really care about the environment and I love to gossip."
It used to be that you had to make female TV characters perfect so no one would be offended by your 'portrayal' of women. Even when I started out on 'The Office' eight years ago, we could write our male characters funny and flawed, but not the women. And now, thankfully, it's completely different.
As a kid, I always loved serialized books. It’s the reason why people love Harry Potter. Serialization is amazing. It works in television. It works in film and it works in books. Especially when you’re a young kid, you get attached to these characters.
I had these kind of unrealistic expectations that were fueled by romantic comedies, and it has both helped me and hurt me in many ways. It helped me because, in general, they've made me hopeful. I just figure things will eventually work out for me. But nobody is like any Tom Hanks character. Nobody is Hugh Grant. No one is Meg Ryan!
