I can shoot off my big mouth and write my shows and run my shows, and I can recognize how lucky I am because my position is rare and my position is privileged.
When I got out of college in 1991, I had four jobs in four different parts of L.A. There was I Love Juicy, a smoothie bar in Venice, and the Videotheque on Sunset Boulevard, across from the old Tower Records. I was also an intern at the 'Los Angeles Reader' in the Miracle Mile and at 'High Performance' magazine downtown.
For a lot of people, film is still the dream - the captive audience in the darkened theater - but I love TV. I think it's fantastic.
I believe in the power of media. I really do. It's my soapbox. And I do have an agenda, because I'm enraged by the limitations forced on people - by poverty, oppression, hatred, fear - and I'm saddened by the kind of loss we all experienced due to the contributions that people cannot make because of their circumstances.
I'm from the creative side of Hollywood. I'm up for anyone that wants to support my work. If you have eyeballs and give me a budget and are nice to me, I'm in.
I was broke when I lived in New York City during college, so I'd spend weekends walking around town, grabbing something to eat, and interacting with strangers. That ritual has stuck with me.
I'm a huge Ira Glass fan; I'm a huge fan of radio in general.
A TV touchstone for me is 'The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd.' That series was whimsical and smart and had the mix of comedy and drama that I now trade in - but with a dash of magical realism. I wanted to be Molly Dodd, but more than that, I wanted to be Jay Tarses, who created the show.
What offends me more than something sexist is something poorly written or unfunny or cliched.
We still have this prudish, puritanical culture, but we also have so little exposure to a diversity of bodies. Bodies are beautiful and great and compelling.
