Maudlin scenes where people pour their heart out to one another? I don't want to see it.
In the 'Garnethill' trilogy, people always forget that Maureen O'Donnell's dad was a journalist and she did art history at uni and her brother did law, but no-one ever thinks they're middle-class - they're just working class because they speak with accents.
I've had the good fortune of working with some amazing people. I mean, my first Broadway show was with Elizabeth Taylor and Maureen Stapleton. Maureen Stapleton, a legend in the theatre; Elizabeth Taylor, a legend, period.
In writing about Harold and Maureen with their terrible unspoken secret, and all those people that Harold meets as he walks to save a friend's life, I was trying to celebrate the ordinary people.
I've seen that phenomenally successful people believe they can learn something from everybody. I call them 'mavericks with mentors.' Richard Branson, for instance, is a total maverick but he surrounds himself with incredibly successful, smart people and he listens to them.
If you're used to being a maverick, then people don't get surprised when you start acting strangely.
When people tell me that I must get my maverick gene from my father, they are only half right. My father and I both have inherited our rebellious personalities from Nana. She has always lived her life on her own terms, something that was once considered quite scandalous, given the times she grew up in.
I've got a feeling that with the best coppers - and in fact the best people in any field of work - what sets them apart is a maverick quality. People who are not afraid to bend the rules in order to achieve the universally desired end.
If you're calling yourself a maverick and you're not Dirk Nowitzki, then you are probably not one. In fact, this rule applies to anyone declaring themselves a 'God-fearing Christian' or a 'Man of the people.'
When I got to the Mavericks people were all giving me advice - change this, change that - and one thing that I didn't do was fire anybody.
For me, it's always been one of my pet peeves to keep people engaged and talking, and just always being interested in what I have going on. To keep the level of creativity always turned up to the max.
I think the best way to find out about something is to try to do it to the max. A lot of people take up a hobby or sport and then find an excuse not to carry on with it. Once I start something, I won't stop until I'm as good at it as I'll ever be.
Maxim for life: You get treated in life the way you teach people to treat you.
Let me remind you of the old maxim: people under suspicion are better moving than at rest, since at rest they may be sitting in the balance without knowing it, being weighed together with their sins.
Many politicians are in the habit of laying it down as a self-evident proposition that no people ought to be free till they are fit to use their freedom. The maxim is worthy of the fool in the old story who resolved not to go into the water till he had learned to swim.
The maxim, that governments ought to train the people in the way in which they should go, sounds well. But is there any reason for believing that a government is more likely to lead the people in the right way than the people to fall into the right way of themselves?
But in terms of how people live together, how we minimize the prospects of conflict and maximize the prospects of peace, the place of religion in our society today is essential.
It is only through developing and maximizing all its natural resources that a sustainable future for Africa and its people can be secured.
I went through absolute stress and mayhem. I couldn't go out, because people were constantly on my back all the time.
When Barack Obama got elected, I remember being in Harlem specifically. I remember watching that whole part of town just swell. People walked the streets, but it wasn't a riot - it wasn't mayhem. It was a unified feeling of euphoria.
