A Quote by Denis Leary

I was working with Peter Tolan, who was my writing partner on those two [Rescue Me and The Job], and he did The Larry Sanders Show with Garry Shandling, and he always said that the second season is better because you know the actors.
The first time I met Garry Shandling was my audition for 'The Larry Sanders Show,' with Garry and his casting director Francine Maisler. I can recall every minute of it. He was gracious and kind, and he read with me. He was terrific.
Most of us got jobs right after 'The Larry Sanders Show' because of 'The Larry Sanders Show.' I know that for a fact for myself.
I was just in a few episodes the first season [ of Empire]. They didn't kill me, but I haven't been back in season two or three. I don't know if they have plans for me or not. But I enjoyed working on it. And I think it's a really talented group of actors and, boy, very enterprising to try and shoot those every week, you know, with musical numbers and all that stuff.
The second season is generally easier do because you know the actors better and they know the characters better and if everybody likes each other you can really go all types of places.
I always thought it was important to overdeliver, and when I got one of my first jobs, writing jokes for Garry Shandling when he was hosting the Grammys, I stayed up all night and wrote a hundred jokes, and I thought, "I'm always going to be the person that gives them more than they requested, and that's why they'll want to keep me around."
I feel I'm better now than I ever have been. You learn so much as you're doing it. I'm watching tapes and I'll see things that get me annoyed and where I know I can improve. I understand better letting the crowd play more. I've always said it was important for me who I was working with, because I like to kid around a lot. But I've also learned to use my partner better. I'm feeling good. There's no reason to stop.
At the beginning of the Larry Sanders show, you know, we were grateful to get guests. At the end, it was as if we actually were The Tonight Show. People would come on, and it had the same sort of imprimatur as if we were on the air. I've been on a lot of talk shows during that time and since then, and people would come up in the dressing room or in the corridors and say, "You guys got it exactly right." Or they would say, "We have Larry Sanders moments every day."
I started a radio show where I interviewed comics. And I interviewed Leno and Seinfeld and John Candy and Father Guido Sarducci and Garry Shandling, all when I was 16. And they kind of told me what to do.
What can I say about a world without Garry Shandling? This is where I need Garry. He would have something pithy, and there would be a laugh, and your heart would break at the same time. He changed my life.
Working on 'The Larry Sanders Show,' everything was there on the paper and in the room and within the four walls when all of us were together. It was just all there.
Garry Shandling has always been a pioneer of… meta entertainment. He's always been a defender of the creative right to use the frame as part of the painting.
Show-running is a very difficult job that includes so many responsibilities; I'm working with the actors, working with directors, writing, making decisions like, 'What fabric is that sofa gonna be?'
Garry Shandling is someone I've publicly gone gay for, for jokes. Oh and anyone in the Twilight movies. I don't know any of their names, but all of them. The wolves, the vampires? They're all fantastic.
A lot of black guys always ask me, 'Did Larry Bird really play that good?' I said, 'Larry Bird is so good it's frightening.'
It's very hard to get people, because it's just one of those things. I mean, everybody is working. And then during the off- season, it's easy, but we don't have the people during the off-season, because the club closes during off-season, so lot of people don't want a part-time job.
They're done by guys who have talked a good game and then have scrambled together the simulacrum of a drama, so actors are habituated to sometimes having to save a picture on the floor because it's usually part of their job, but they'd rather have a writer doing his job, so that they can do theirs. But I like nothing better than working with actors.
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