Words matter. These are the best Michael Hirst Quotes, and they’re great for sharing with your friends.
Of course I had written a film about Elizabeth I, and I loved the Tudor period, and I think at the time Working Title and I had debated on whether to do Elizabeth I or Henry VIII. I’d always wanted to do Henry VIII. Like Elizabeth, I’d had this feeling that it had never properly been addressed.
With ‘Vikings,’ I had the task of making these people interesting and, to a point, sympathetic.
With ‘The Tudors,’ I had a huge amount of material, I mean so many books and so much stuff about what they really said. So, in a way it was kind of trying to strip it out and find the stories inside all this material.
Once I engage in something, I really engage in it, and I love the process of reading and researching because I come from an academic background.
People love cliches. If you can give people cliches, that’s very good TV, then.
When you’re making a TV drama, the showrunner is God, and so however onerous and difficult and consuming that responsibility is, you’re being treated with respect, so it changes your whole outlook to the production. You’re being asked about costumes, set design, music, every aspect of the show.
Nobody knows what really happened in any historical period. There are some periods where we know more than others, though.
If you’re in America or Europe, walk for three blocks, and you’ll pass about 14 Vikings. Their reach was immense.
For ‘Vikings,’ we have to do so much outside shooting, and it’s normally – I think with American shows, it’ll be 60 or 70 percent inside and a little bit outside, but with us, it’s almost 70 percent outside, and that’s huge and really difficult.
First episodes are difficult things to write.
It works better if your lead character is complex and interesting and not perfect.
The Vikings certainly didn’t write anything about themselves; it was not a literate, but rather a pagan, culture. So what we get was written later by Christian monks. But there were occasional reportings and recordings of people who had traded usually with the Vikings.
When I did ‘The Tudors,’ there was massive information available and a ready-made market.
I’m very bad at delegating writing responsibilities, because I’ve never been able to do it; I’ve never had any help or looked for any help.
I got interested in the Vikings, and then you realize that there isn’t much to be read about them because they did not write their history. It was written by hostile witnesses, by Christian monks and so on. From what I could see and understand, I was really excited about it. I loved their culture and loved their gods.
I couldn’t give ‘Vikings’ away – I mean, I love these people. And I’m not sure anyone else writing it would necessarily have the same feeling towards the characters that I do.
I only have one idol: John Lennon.