I don't want to have to battle sponsors and agencies.
I don't want to have to push for something that I want
and have to settle for second best.
I don't want to have to compromise all the time,
which in essence is what the television writer does
if he wants to put on controversial things.
The guy who makes his success is immediately assailed by everybody
and you suddenly find yourself having to compromise along the line
giving so many hours to work
with his proportionate number of fewer hours to family.
And this is inherent in our business.
Ed Brodkin, who was a TV producer
who was associated with some of your earlier players
has said this about you.
He said, Rod is either going to stay commercial
or become a discerning artist,
but not both.
I remember the quote.
I didn't understand it at the time.
I failed to achieve any degree of understanding in the ensuing years,
but I didn't see a number.
I presume her means that inherently you cannot be commercial
and artistic.
You cannot be commercial and quality.
You cannot be commercial concurrent with having a preoccupation
with the level of storytelling that you want to achieve.
And this I have to reject.
I don't think calling something commercial
tags it with a kind of an odious suggestion
that it stinks,
that it's something raunchy to be ashamed of.
If you say commercial means to be publicly acceptable,
what's wrong with that?
As long as you are not ashamed of anything you write,
if you're a writer,
as long as you're not ashamed of anything you perform
if you're an actor,
I could have done probably 30 or 40 film series
over the past five years,
but I turned them down because I didn't like them.
I did not think they were quality.
But I think innate in what Herb says
is this suggestion made by many people
that you can't have public acceptance
to still be artistic.
And as I say, I have to reject that.
I have never written beneath myself.
I've never written anything
that I didn't want my name attached to.
I have probed deeper in some scripts
and I've been more successful in some than others.
But all of them that have been on,
you know, I'll take my lick.
I eat their mind and that's the way I want it.
Broad-serving story can be summed up
in just a few words.
It hasn't been a long road,
but it's been a hard one.
And the last couple of miles
have been paved with gold.
It's been a long road.
