This Is A Time For Serious People,

The Hardest Thing For Me Is Getting Started. If I'm Writing A Script, Really 90 Per Cent Of It Would Be Just Walking Around, Climbing The Walls, Just Trying To Put The Idea Together. Then The Final 10 Per Cent Would Be Writing It.

If You Close Your Eyes You Can Imagine The Hackers Sitting In A Room, Combing Through The Documents To Find The Ones That Will Draw The Most Blood. And In A Room Next Door Are American Journalists Doing The Same Thing. As Demented And Criminal As It Is, At Least The Hackers Are Doing It For A Cause. The Press Is Doing It For A Nickel.

I Wrote The Show West Wing For The Two Years Before And The Two Years After 9/11. Suddenly Everyone In The World Had Been Through Something That Our Characters Had Not Been Through; The Whole Trajectory Of The World Had Changed. Yet Our Show Took Place In A Parallel Universe. I Wasn't Really Sure What To Do About This. In No One's Wildest Dreams Did It Occur That An Event Like This Could Possibly Happen.

I'm A Playwright. All I Care About Is The Play Being Good.

I Had Never Thought Of Doing Television. But My Agent Wanted Me To Meet John Wells, Who Had Had A Lot Of Success Producing Er And China Beach. The Night Before The Meeting, Some Friends Were Over For Dinner And Akiva Goldsman And I Slipped Downstairs To The Basement So We Could Sneak A Cigarette. He Said, "you Know What Would Make A Good Television Series? That." And He Was Pointing At The American President Poster. He Said, "there Doesn't Have To Be A Romance, Just Focus On A Senior Staffer."