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" If you look at 'American Horror Story' or 'Crime Story,' these are visceral, action-packed, sometimes bloody episodes of television. They're not 'feminine.' They're not about sexy women sitting around looking beautiful, drinking lattes. These episodes are calling cards to show companies like Marvel, 'Look, women can do these kind of movies.' "

Ryan Murphy

Sexy

Story

" The greatest thing that you have when you're a showrunner is this opportunity to create worlds. "

" One of the unique things about 'American Horror Story' is, it's very respectful to actors. Actors in many cases don't want to be tied down to a seven-year contract. So my deal with the cast is: you're free after every year: you can come back, or you cannot come back. "

" It's a weird thing, my shows. I don't know how to describe it, but I feel because I go about the casting process so slowly that it does feel like an instant family. "

" I think I have a pattern of nice and lovely and then dark and twisted. "

" All the things I have done at one point or another have fallen out of fashion, and there's nothing better than trying to bring something back to life. "

" I love 'Girls' on HBO because it's brave and cool. "

" I think the great thing about a television set is that it can be turned on and off, and you don't have to watch it if you think it's going to be something that you're not going to like or learn from. "

" I'm not interested in anything but emotionally driven stories; that's why almost all of my work is exclusively anchored by women. "

" I love Olivia De Havilland. She is forever a lady. "

" I only wrote two fan letters in my life. One was to Bette Davis. And one was to Ron Palillo, who played Horshack on 'Welcome Back, Kotter.' And Ron did not write me back, but Bette Davis did. "

" I would much rather have watched Jill Clayburgh in 'An Unmarried Woman' than 'Star Wars.' Even though I saw that movie when I was 11, I related emotionally to being left and thrown in a trash can on the side of the road. Her damage - I got it. I didn't understand Han Solo at all. "

" I had been accepted to film school, but my parents couldn't afford it, and yet they made too much money for me to get a scholarship. "

Ryan Murphy

School

Too Much

" With all of my work, it always takes a while for people to get it. "

" Well, I'm from Indiana. So to me when I was a little kid growing up, Cincinnati was the glamorous New York of it all. "

Ryan Murphy

New York

Growing

" I do work with a lot of women in my company, and I write a lot of roles for women over 40. I think, in 'Feud' alone, we have 15 roles for women over 40, which I'm very proud about. "

" I've always been sort of, 'I love it,' or, 'I hate it,' and I think, as a result, I've always been a polarizing person. You either love me or you hate me. There's not a lot of 'Hmmm.' "

" In television and the movie business, the people who are promoted and the people who are mentored always look like the white guys. "

Ryan Murphy

People

Business

" I love actors, but I really love actresses, and I really love actresses whose work touched and informed my coming-up years. "

" People think I'm just sort of this P. T. Barnum, razzle-dazzle guy. They think I go out of my way to be outlandish and theatrical at the expense of having emotions. They don't get that there's another side to me, and I keep trying to show that other side. "

" When I was starting out in Hollywood, everything was such a battle. "

" When I started, you couldn't do anything. A gay person trying to write a gay character in 1998 - it was so difficult. "

" Part of being an artist is being able to write about the world you live in and the times that you've been a part of. "

" I actually think actors both are drawn to playing real-life historical people and are terrified. "

" Joan Crawford and Bette Davis are larger than life. They just are. They sucked all the oxygen out of a room: they're icons; they loom large in our imaginations. But the truth of the matter is both women were diminutive. "

" I'm very black and white about what I like or don't like, and I've always been that way. "

" Tone is everything in TV. "

Ryan Murphy

Tone

Everything

" I am not going to do anything unless I am afraid of it. "

" I'm fascinated by the whole clown phobia thing because I personally don't have it. "

" You've not felt the pain of rejection until a television show based on your own life is canceled. "