Zitat des Tages von Jonathan Krisel:
Everything else was snarky and high concept, while 'Roseanne' was just a normal family.
I'm never trying to make something esoteric; it just happens.
One second here and there will make all the difference between something being funny and not being funny. That's why I like going, 'Well, we wrote that six months ago, and it was funny one time we read it, but it's not funny anymore. So what? Just dump it.'
The end goal is to make a piece that everybody has ownership over and everybody's proud of because everybody contributed to it. I think there's a communist, socialist vibe to 'Portlandia' to make it work.
I look at a show like 'Roseanne.' That's super influential on me. It's very funny, very real, with real problems. That was a big influence, and I don't know if you see that all the time in the network world.
Things that people are doing constantly but aren't thinking about. That's the ultimate 'Portlandia' concept.
Portland is utopia. My favorite thing would be it's earnestness. I am earnest, too.
Once the big lights come in, you can feel self-conscious. How can you capture the scene without ruining it and freezing people up? You keep it small and lean.
The Internet is a good way to try some stuff with no big crew and no money being spent. Since there are no stakes to it, you can try to be a little experimental.
My whole thing is, you listen to the actor and help them bring out their best thing.
'Fawlty Towers' was a huge influence on me. I mean, it was so slapstick, too. 'Are You Being Served?' was on 15 times a day, it seemed like, and I loved it.
I want to work with extremely, genuinely charismatic people.
Louie Anderson thinks my thing is the absurdness of reality. That's what we do on 'Portlandia' all the time. I try to bring that absurdness of reality to everything.
'Portlandia' is 100 percent improvised, and I came into this business not knowing anything.
My brand of comedy is taking a serious approach to silliness. Small moments of modern life and human behavior make me laugh. At least that's where everything starts, and then my other through line would be a dry absurdity that exponentially spirals out of reality.
Certain shows, when it's all comedy, it's like when you eat something that's too sweet and it just tastes gross. You need that salted caramel.
It's how you define yourself. It's not Nirvana or Pearl Jam: it's, 'Do you watch 'Portlandia' or 'Amy Schumer'?' It relates to a specific sense of humor. And, 'Do you know the hidden gems?' Like, if you knew the Pixies in the '80s.
There is no 'recycle too much.' That's an oxymoron.
Comedy is like horror - you have to shock something in the viewer's system to make them feel it.
When you make a pilot, you've never seen the show before; you don't know what it is.
I think any person who is starting out in a creative endeavor is not going to be good at it right out of the gate.
Everything on TV is perfect, and it's so boring.
I went to film school, and I came in when video art was king, weird stuff was king, and there, you don't have a script as your bible.
I think when you work with people who are super exceptional, there's simplicity to it because everybody is on the same page in terms of tone.
A lot of the 'Portlandia' characters and a lot of the moments aren't really TV-worthy, but that's what is so refreshing about seeing them.
Bands on tour are very good cultivators of what's the avant-garde of comedy.
You can use cheap technology to get a great look.
I always want to push myself.
There's a good family of actors in 'Portlandia.' It's a small community with people who pop up again and again. The show's a little weird show, and you want to grow with the people who are in it, like Dana who plays the chicken waitress, and Ellen who was the adult babysitter.
If you have, especially with siblings, something like the competition for mom's affection, it just never goes away.
I love working with nonactors.
I know, especially in my family, people's feelings get hurt over the tiniest things. I'm sure that's true in every family. But, for instance, one year, I came a little bit late to Thanksgiving, and I was supposed to bring a salad. And I just brought a bag of lettuce, and put it in a bowl. Five years later, I heard that my mom was incensed.
I saw Sleater Kinney perform back when I was in college.
It's exciting being in the present. You're always reading emails, talking about the future, looking at pictures on Facebook of the past. But living in the present? It's almost a dead medium. I almost want to do a sketch about being in the present.