Quotes About Television

My kids watch everything downloaded; they have no idea what the numbers or the names of the channels mean, except, 'FX makes the show that I see on my computer.' So it's harder to get a show on the air, but at the same time, there are a lot of terrific shows.

The first time I met Garry Shandling was my audition for 'The Larry Sanders Show,' with Garry and his casting director Francine Maisler. I can recall every minute of it. He was gracious and kind, and he read with me. He was terrific.

When I started on 'Strictly,' I was terrified. Live television seemed like the most daunting thing in the world.

The only way to do news on television is not to be terrified of it.

I would be terrified if Bill Maher was like, 'Hey, do you want to come on the show?' I would be like, 'Oh, God.' It would completely terrify me, even though I'm such a junkie for the show.

My parents had this relationship that was really terrifying. I mean, the level of hatred that they had, and the level of physical abuse - my mother would beat up my father, basically - and I think I was drawn to images on television that were bright and reflective.

If I actually thought about 'Fresh Meat' going on television, I just couldn't or wouldn't do it - it's so terrifying!

It's a very strange and quite terrifying experience to watch yourself on TV. I never like to do it with other people.

You're under the gun at all times because it's live TV. A lot of time, between dress and air, you're having to come with an entire ending to your sketch that gets an even better, bigger laugh - which is terrifying... People are filing into the audience, and you're writing a new joke for the end of it.

Hit shows are very difficult to achieve. You need to have everything just right - that's what's so terrifying.

I went door-to-door selling cable television subscriptions when I was in college. Not to date myself, but cable was just coming on. I had terrible territories, and they would give me $25, if I got somebody to let them come and just put the little cord in their house.

The thing that people should remember, is that back in the day, because wrestling does not have a season, every week is a week of first run TV. In the territories that I worked in, specifically, we never had a rerun. So those shows that aired, aired one time to their constituency.

'Friends' played in this territory of being funny, and then also just grabbing your heart. And not afraid of that. It was a comedic soap opera. Not being afraid to have an audience feel something, laugh and cry, was quite extraordinary and quite wonderful.

Television is an intimately personal medium, especially with so many people watching on their phones or laptops. Style pressure comes with the territory.

It's so much fun playing Ling, but I have this fear that people are going to run away from me in terror on the streets. They think I'm going to bite their heads off or something.

I have been defending Israel's right to exist, and to defend itself against terrorism, for many years-on college campuses, in television appearances and in debate.

In a sense, terrorism blossomed in the advent of television. Television promotes terrorism in religion and in politics.

I look at my early career, and you know, when I left drama school, for a young Asian actor, you could either play a doctor on 'Holby City,' or you could play a terrorist in 'Spooks' and get to wear a nice shiny suit.

But of course when people watch morning television, Terry, it's a very different animal. You know, they're running around, they're getting their kids ready for school, they're probably doing eight million things, they're brushing their teeth.

I don't think 'X Factor' would put someone in front of the camera on purpose if they were ill. I don't think that's something they would do. There's psychologists who test out all the contestants before they go on.

You audition, and then you go and do what's called a test, your network test. So you have to go in front of the network and do it, and the network has to sign off on you.

The mark of a really great satire is its ability to seem prophetic, and I think that the television culture that film predicted really came true in the age of reality television and is a testament to how great it really is.

In between shooting for 'Awake,' I was attempting to have my own pilot season. The audition for 'Anger Management' actually came during a week that I was already testing for a couple other shows and we weren't really letting any other shows into the mix.

The truth is there's a difference between the competition shows where you're testing skills and the type of shows where you're trying to create drama.