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But HBO is less interested in how many people are watching than in how much the people who are watching are liking the show. They didn't set up their business model to make writers happy. It's just a nice unintended consequence.

I'm on record saying that HBO is the best television company in the world, and I believe they are. I think they absolutely understand how to make television that is really, really vital and interesting and visceral, and all the things that television really should be.

I think HBO seems to have an extraordinary clever knack of catching the pulse of its audience. It really, really knows its audience.

I forget sometimes that I'm in the HBO stable because I am such a fan of so much of their programming. Like, 'The Wire' is my favorite TV show of all time.

There are only a few TV networks that really invest in production in the way that I think they should. HBO, obviously, is one of them.

I was opposed to doing TV for a long time because I thought the quality of writing wasn't very strong, as opposed to film, but there's been a shift in term of the quality of scripts. HBO has attracted a tremendous amount of great writing talent.

It used to be that you had to do a certain number of episodes to hit syndication in order to try to keep a show on, because it's important to the network because it sells good commercial time. That's really not how HBO does things.

HBO is really famous for hiring good people and staying out of their way until they ask for help, or need it. And that reputation is earned.

I have nothing but respect for HBO.

Television is much more complex, brain-challenging and involved than it used to be. It's almost impossible to watch a television show from 15 years ago; it's just too boring. I think modern television shows, with their intricate plots, are stimulating our minds. This is one reason IQs have been going up.