Good writers borrow from other writers. Great writers steal from them outright.

I'm not interested in the difference between good and bad, I'm interested in the differences between good and great.

Music is what mathematics does on a Saturday night.

You can only write, 'Somebody wants something, something else is in their way of getting it.'

An artist’s job is to captivate… if we stumble into truth, we got lucky.

Socializing on the internet is to socializing what reality TV is to reality.

Rule of storytelling: When a character is shoved against a wall, shove them against a wall harder.

Tell me what you think and then tell me what the really smart person in the room who disagrees with you thinks.

The real problem with all drugs is that they work. Fantastically. They're great, right up until the moment they kill you.

A friend is somebody who says the same things to your face that they would say if you're not in the room.

Develop your own compass, and trust it. Take risks, dare to fail, remember the first person through the wall always gets hurt.

The first dead man on Omaha Beach must be a sailor!

Howard Beale is processed, instant God, and right now it looks like he might just go over bigger than Mary Tyler Moore.

Television will do anything for a rating... anything!

Television is not the truth. Television is a goddamned amusement park.

You're not such a dog as you think you are.

You don't send a man to his death because you want a hero.

This was the story of Howard Beale: The first known instance of a man who was killed because he had lousy ratings.

I'm not sentimental about war. I see nothing noble in widows.