I've always read a lot of historical books and I'm a big fan of documentaries, and I've always thought of ways to do it.

One of the tricky things about running a TV show is that you just never know how good the guest stars you cast on a weekly basis, how good they're going to be in the episode. Sometimes they surprise you in good ways and sometimes they surprise you in disappointing ways.

I always think it's better to take your time and go through a lot of ideas - and dismiss a lot of ideas - before figuring out where to land. It's a good way to care for your audience, too. If you spend hours and hours and days and weeks coming up with the ending, then there's a chance the fans won't figure it out on their own.

I don't want my writing to be so unique that when you apply it to different genres, it seems like the previous show that people know you from.

I would say on a creative level I put a lot of pressure on myself.

There are certain economics involved in making a network TV show that you want to amortize the costs of that, so the more episodes you make, the cheaper they all are individually.

In order to appeal to a wider audience on network in order to survive, generally your characters need to be, at a base level, a little bit more likable.