Nevins Quotes & Sayings

Probably in all our history no foe has been so detested as were the Japanese. Emotions forgotten since our most savage Indian wars were reawakened. — Allen Nevins

History is the sextant of states which, tossed by wind and current, would be lost in confusion if they could not fix their position. — Allan Nevins

I have very simple ambitions. If I can just not be boring, I'm ahead of the game. It's hard in television. I think you get enormous reward from the audience. Just give them something they didn't see coming, and you get enormous points. — David Nevins

I like stories with a collision of disparate tones. Look at 'Shameless' or 'House of Lies'. They go from big, silly, and comedic to very real dramatic moments in the wink of an eye. — David Nevins

To me, I read good reviews in lots of papers and bad reviews in lots of papers. — Sheila Nevins

All we can do about this nightmare we live in is to create, if we are very lucky, a few islands of love and trust to sustain us and help us forget. But love dies while the lovers go on living, and Woolrich excels at making us watch while relationships corrode. He knew the horrors that both love and lovelessness can breed, yet he created very few irredeemably evil characters; for with whoever loves or needs love, Woolrich identifies, all of that person's dark side notwithstanding.
("Introduction") — Francis M. Nevins Jr.

His most characteristic detective stories end with the realization that no rational account of events is possible, and his suspense stories tend to close with terror not dissipated but omnipresent, like God.
("Introduction") — Francis M. Nevins Jr.

This may not be art as art commonly goes; the lack of discipline, of control, would seem to rule it out of that category. And yet Woolrich's lack of control over emotions is a crucial element in his work, not only because it intensifies the fragility and momentariness of love but also because it tears away the comfortable belief, evident in some of the greatest works of the human imagination such as Oedipus Rex, that nobility in the face of nothingness is possible. And if Woolrich's work is not art as commonly understood, there is an art beyond art, whose form is not the novel or story but the scream; and of this art Woolrich is beyond doubt a master. ("Introduction") — Francis M. Nevins Jr.

In all my shows, I'm not interested in the iconic shots of the Capitol and the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial. I'm always interested in trying to get the culture of the place - trying to get it right. — David Nevins

But suspense presupposes uncertainty. No matter how nightmarish the situation, real suspense is impossible when we know in advance that the protagonist will prevail (as we would if Woolrich had used series characters) or will be destroyed. This is why, despite his congenital pessimism, Woolrich manages any number of times to squeeze out an upbeat resolution. Precisely because we can never know whether a particular novel or story will be light or dark, allegre or noir, his work remains hauntingly suspenseful.
("Introduction") — Francis M. Nevins Jr.

I do less-fanciful reality. I celebrate the fat, the ugly, the women who can't get guys. I'm not trying to entertain you; I'm trying to make you passionate. — Sheila Nevins

I like shows that are surprising and not predictable. That have deep, rich characters that are fully formed. — David Nevins

I actually have very girly taste in television. I like a chicky relationship show probably more than anything. I really like 'Project Runway'. — David Nevins

Woolrich had a genius for creating types of story perfectly consonant with his world: the noir cop story, the clock race story, the waking nightmare, the oscillation thriller, the headlong through the night story, the annihilation story, the last hours story. These situations, and variations on them, and others like them, are paradigms of our position in the world as Woolrich sees it. His mastery of suspense, his genius (like that of his spiritual brother Alfred Hitchcock) for keeping us on the edge of our seats and gasping with fright, stems not only from the nightmarish situations he conjured up but from his prose, which is compulsively readable, cinematically vivid, high-strung almost to the point of hysteria, forcing us into the skins of the hunted and doomed where we live their agonies and die with them a thousand small deaths. — Francis M. Nevins Jr.

History is never above the melee. It is not allowed to be neutral, but forced to enlist in every army. — Allan Nevins

I want a documentary to crest by being voted on by 6000 people who are in the business of telling stories. — Sheila Nevins

The hallmarks of the noir style are fear, guilt and loneliness, breakdown and despair, sexual obsession and social corruption, a sense that the world is controlled by, malignant forces preying on us, a rejection of happy endings and a preference for resolutions heavy with doom, but always redeemed by a breathtakingly vivid poetry of word (if the work was a novel or story) or image (if it was a movie). ("Introduction") — Francis M. Nevins Jr.

Long before the Theater of the Absurd, Woolrich discovered that an incomprehensible universe is best reflected in an incomprehensible story.
("Introduction") — Francis M. Nevins Jr.

I'm always interested in trying to stay on the cutting edge of television storytelling. To be slightly in front, pushing for the next new thing. — David Nevins

The enemy of good television is boredom and predictability. — David Nevins

I get very nervous when it's quiet, because I think it's dead. What I learned in the moment was to hold back a little before you talk. — Sheila Nevins

Like the playwrights of the Absurd, Woolrich recognized that a senseless story best mirrors a senseless existence. — Francis M. Nevins Jr.

Gray Man. The Gray Man was created by Sarah Orne Jewett and appeared in "The Gray Man" (A White Heron and Other Stories, 1886). Jewett also created Lady Ferry. "The Gray Man" is one of Jewett's best supernatural short stories, which means it is very good indeed. — Jess Nevins

I love being a producer, and I think I essentially still operate as a producer even though I now have control of marketing and the ability to green-light shows - something every producer wants but that they don't get! — David Nevins

I'm an instant responder. Somebody told me I'm a living Twitter. I'm quick to respond and quick to fill air. — Sheila Nevins

I sold 'Time Life' books on the telephone. It's probably the only pure skill job I've ever had. When you're on and you're good, you get 'yes' after 'yes.' When you're slightly off, you get rejection after rejection. It was one of the greatest jobs I ever had. It was brutal. — David Nevins

If history were a photograph of the past it would be flat and uninspiring. Happily, it is a painting; and, like all works of art, it fails of the highest truth unless imagination and ideas are mixed with the paints. — Allan Nevins

I am grieved that these continuing stories are everyday matters swept away, — Sheila Nevins

So much of television is incredibly predictable. You watch the first five minutes and you know where it's going to go. If you can just create an element of surprise in both the storytelling and tone of a show, you're going to be way ahead of the pack. — David Nevins

When it comes to storytelling, not taking risks is riskier than swinging for the fences. I have very simple ambitions when it comes to taking risks in storytelling and programming. I try very hard to avoid the expected. — David Nevins

One of the fundamental issues with The Vatican is that the world changed on us. That show was conceived and written while Pope Benedict was still in charge of the Vatican, and it was conceived in a world that now would feel very dated. — David Nevins