Just put your best foot forward and hope for the best. You also have to acknowledge that you're going to make mistakes.

As a storyteller, you also don't want to make people feel like they're left out, like other people who have read the book have an interior knowledge of this show, and the degree of difficulty in watching it is much higher.

I don't think it's hubris for me to say I'm a Trek fan. So, I don't treat Trek fans as somebody who's separate than I am. The only thing that separates them is, I'm one of the people responsible for the story in this movie and they're not. But we're all Trek fans. I can hang.

The best jokes on The Leftovers are the ones that make you feel a little sick to your stomach.

For us, there's an inherent process when you're ending something to be thinking about the beginning, as writers.

I'm not glass-half-full, glass-half-empty; I'm like, "There's a glass?"

I place a higher value on work ethic than talent, because, in certain areas, you just need to cast, you need to cast actors with talent, you need to hire directors with talent, but I've worked with very talented people who have a poor work ethic, and the outcome is less desirable than people who are less talented and have an incredible work ethic.