Maria Semple
Maria Semple
Maria Keogh Semple is an American novelist and screenwriter. She is the author of This One Is Mineand Where'd You Go, Bernadette. Her television credits include Beverly Hills, 90210, Mad About You, Saturday Night Live, Arrested Development, Suddenly Susan and Ellen...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionScreenwriter
Date of Birth17 June 1964
CountryUnited States of America
room sideways spent time
Much of the time in the writer's room is spent working on story, and I was always challenging myself to make it more interesting, tighter and more surprising: to come at it sideways in a way that the audience wasn't expecting.
anytime blown cursed men spent time watch writers
I'm consistently blown away by 'Mad Men.' Having spent so much time in the writers' room, I'm cursed in that anytime I watch something, I'm always calculating what the writers are up to.
gets steer
I steer clear of any novel that gets billed as a 'meditation.'
I know what it's like to feel snobby; I know what it's like to feel anxiety; I know what it's like to feel like busted because you're crazy.
thrill
I just feel like there's this illicit thrill in reading other people's mail and spying on their lives.
art people relate turning
I guess that's what art is: Turning something painful into something people can relate to.
mind
I don't mind finding these ugly sides to my personality and exaggerating them because that's something you can write towards.
held ted
I attended TED in 2007 and 2008, the last two years the conference was held in Monterey.
Even when I was writing 'Where'd You Go, Bernadette,' I started to appreciate Seattle's many charms.
both complex reads
Both 'Where'd You Go, Bernadette' and my first novel, 'This One is Mine,' are pretty complex on a story level, and fun reads as a result.
good tv work
And dialogue, I'm good at it, and it's because it's the only thing you have to work with in TV writing.
menace society
An artist must create. If she doesn't, she will become a menace to society.
begin born clear learned until
I learned that comedy is born out of strong characters. I won't begin writing a character until I have a clear take on them.
felt fit natural worked
'Mad About You' fit my sensibility the most of any show that I worked on, and as a result, it was really fun. It felt like a very natural fit.