We have a lot of women on the staff, obviously. It's a predominantly female writing staff and we hire the best people. It's not like we go we need more women or we need four women directing.

My advice is that if you really want to be a screenwriter, get out here and be ready to take no for an answer many times until you find your way through it and are fortunate enough to get something made.

By luck I mean, when opportunity meets preparation.

One of the magical things about Nashville is just how many incredibly talented people are here and the way they support each other.

We get the best people we can get and it turns out a lot of them are women. I've said this before If you hire people solely on their merit you wind up hiring a lot of women. I wonder how many other shows even come close to our numbers.

I call myself a feminist, not a feminist filmmaker. If somebody asked me if I had a feminist sensibility it would be pretty hard to deny, but is it the theme of my work? Not necessarily. I'm interested in a lot of things.

When people know I wrote 'Thelma and Louise,' they don't want to mess with me.