Home
Authors
Tags
App
Get QuoteDark Inspirational Quotes App
" People expect me to be, first and foremost, a storyteller. I lead by telling stories. "
Shonda Rhimes
Me
First
People
Related Quotes:
" This is going to sound crazy, but there was a period of time where on TLC they would show those surgeries - like a woman had a 90-pound tumor, or they separated these twins. And my sister and I - she lived in Ohio when I lived in California - would watch them together on the phone. "
Shonda Rhimes
Crazy
Time
Sister
" I've never personally had to use a Planned Parenthood. But I have many friends who have and do and did, and I think it's important that that access be there for everyone. "
Shonda Rhimes
Never
Think
Friends
" What's great about Netflix is that everything is kind of instantaneous, and it goes around the world instantly. Everything is released at once. The format can be a little bit whatever you want. "
Shonda Rhimes
You
Great
Kind
" For me, beauty is me at the top of my game, going as hard as I can, without fear of what anyone else thinks. Believing in yourself when nobody else is believing in you is half the battle about anything. "
Shonda Rhimes
Game
Fear
Yourself
" I have all these friends who just love therapy, and I always say the reason that I'm absolutely not in therapy is because then I wouldn't have anything to write. "
Shonda Rhimes
Friends
Say
Reason
" It's important to have people who are absolutely willing to say you're wrong or who have a totally different perspective than you do on everything. Fresh ideas are hard to come by, and good ones are even harder. "
Shonda Rhimes
Perspective
You
People
" I spent a lot of times sitting in big rooms full of a lot of men and executives thinking, 'What would Oprah say right now?' and trying to channel that as hard as I could. And mostly that was just about having the confidence. If this woman did it, it can be done. And there's no reason for anybody to stop you. "
Shonda Rhimes
Men
You
Woman
" Calling a show a 'guilty pleasure' is like saying 'I'm embarrassed to say I watch it but I can't stop.' That's not a compliment. "
Shonda Rhimes
Guilty
Stop
Saying
" If we're not shooting, if we're not filming, if you're not standing on the soundstage, turn off your phone and go live your life. "
Shonda Rhimes
Life
Live
Phone
" My worst trait is that I'm an introvert. When I've led stuff, the hardest thing for me to overcome has been my natural desire to run and hide. I'm very proud of the fact that I have been able to do that. "
Shonda Rhimes
Run
Proud
Overcome
" 'Scandal' has always lived in this dark place with this idea that Washington is filled with this underbelly of monsters, that if the real world understood how dark, twisted and corrupt it really was, they would never agree with our government or want to be part of it. It's been kind of fun to live in that world. It felt like a fictional world. "
Shonda Rhimes
Fun
Dark
Government
" I don't ever approach anything from the issue first, so I can't tell you that I've thought about tackling universal health care. I'd have to have some great story I'd want to tell, and then universal health care would become part of the way to tell that story. "
Shonda Rhimes
You
Great
Thought
" The entire world is skewed from the white male perspective. If you're a woman, they have to say it's a female-driven comedy. If it's a comedy with Latinos in it, it's a Latino comedy. 'Normal' is white male, and I find that to be shocking and ridiculous. "
Shonda Rhimes
Woman
World
Perspective
" I think any time you allow someone to see themselves reflected in another person on screen, there's validation there. It's hard to feel strong and sure of yourself when you're 15, but if you can turn on your television or computer and see someone who makes you feel like, 'I can be that strong...' there's validation there. "
Shonda Rhimes
Feel
Yourself
Time
" Shondaland is my company. I run that mother. I am in charge. I am the leader. It's fantastic. It's also really hard. As it should be. "
Shonda Rhimes
Company
I Am
Hard
" I think my goal is to find a way to spend all of my time writing. I mean, sort of; true success is I'm doing nothing but writing if I do my job correctly. "
Shonda Rhimes
Success
Think
Goal
" There's always women of many different races on my shows, and there are always women who look many different ways, but there is still a size thing in this industry. It's hard. I mean to have to say, 'I want a larger woman to be an actor on my shows.' Or, 'Find me a larger woman,' is almost insulting to me. "
Shonda Rhimes
Look
Me
Say
" When I'm hard at work, when I'm deep in it, there is no other feeling. For me, my work is at all times building a nation out of thin air. It is manning the troops. It is painting a canvas. It is hitting every high note. It is running a marathon. It is being Beyonce. And it is all of those things at the same time. "
Shonda Rhimes
Deep
Me
Work
" Most writing staffs have this crazy high turnover, and then everyone's really miserable, and I don't understand that. I don't know why you don't grow people to then be able to take over as you. That's how I can have more shows. "
Shonda Rhimes
Writing
Crazy
People
" I don't understand why people don't understand that the world of TV should look like the world outside of TV. "
Shonda Rhimes
TV
Understand
Why
" The way I write my shows, every character is its own organic thing. No character has a life at all until I see it played by somebody. "
Shonda Rhimes
Character
I See
Own
" My poor children have been the subject of all of my experiments. We're still doing what I call 'Amish summers' where I turn off all electronics and pack away all their computers and stuff and watch them scream for a while until they settle down into, like, an electronic-free summer. "
Shonda Rhimes
Children
Computers
Down
" I don't know why people don't feel like being positive is much more powerful than being negative. "
Shonda Rhimes
People
Powerful
Positive
" You have to have more people who don't look like you in the writers room. I try to have some people who don't look like me in my writers room. I think it's important to have a group of voices, of people who can dissent. "
Shonda Rhimes
Group
Me
Look
" I think the point of our country, our planet, the reason we're all here, one of the best things that we can do is be concerned about something even when it doesn't concern us. That's the whole point. "
Shonda Rhimes
Country
Here
Reason
" I do say all I've ever written about is being alone. And most people take that as, 'Oh, that's so sad.' And I always say, 'No. No, all I ever write about is being alone, and sometimes that's a beautiful, beautiful thing.' "
Shonda Rhimes
Alone
Say
Being Alone
" I don't care what color you are, what size you are, where you're from. It is disturbing that there's an idea that only tall, thin, willowy, size 0 women are attractive - even for the tall, thin, willowy, size 0 woman! We all should get to feel like there's something powerful and beautiful about who we are. "
Shonda Rhimes
Women
Color
Woman
" Frankly, the idea that we need to be beautiful, if you really think about it, it's odd. But if you can turn it inward and see yourself as beautiful, that's what changes the world. "
Shonda Rhimes
Beautiful
Yourself
Think
" There are stories to be told that are still untold and characters to be portrayed that haven't been portrayed correctly. So there's work to be done. "
Shonda Rhimes
Work
Still
Untold
" Work doesn't work without play. "
Shonda Rhimes
Without
Work
Play