We live in a culture that has a real hard time distinguishing fiction from reality. Even when they're told something is fiction.

In the summer of 2010, I had decided to get into film and TV writing, so I wrote scripts for six different ideas I had developed, and the pilot for True Detective was one of them.

For me as a storyteller, I want to follow the characters and the story through what they organically demand.

Often, what allows someone to behave heroically in dire circumstances is unpalatable in day-to-day life.

Whatever I watched, whatever I loved in 36 years of life on Earth, probably had some influence on me.

There's never been anything I didn't love that I didn't connect with on a personal level because to some degree, I projected upon it.

I didn't come to Hollywood to be subservient to anyone else's vision.