How that happened - how the money and the power arrayed itself and who got the share in that, who got cut out, who was exploited and who did the exploiting - that to me is a story of The Deuce that's more about almost the America that we inhabit today, more than just merely about pornography or prostitution.

There are two Americas - separate, unequal, and no longer even acknowledging each other except on the barest cultural terms. In the one nation, new millionaires are minted every day. In the other, human beings no longer necessary to our economy, to our society, are being devalued and destroyed.

The drug war is a holocaust in slow motion.

To be told you've won a MacArthur fellowship is very flattering and gratifying personally.

Doesn't matter if you're fourteen or if you're eight, there's an incredible vernacular that I do believe has become more and more plausible to talk this way in the public sphere, I think because we live in such a coarse and pornographic era. Years of this has produced a certain amount of misogyny that is just a given of life in America at this point.

You can't make a good show based on pure verisimilitude, pure anti-drama. But you have to acknowledge a lot of ordinary life. Most TV doesn't do that.

It is your birthright to have a life of meaning and purpose. Whether or not the people in your life have consistently celebrated your incarnation, you deserve to celebrate your existence.