Page 9 - Make Hbo News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

The networks which are saying, you can come to us where you'll make more money but you'll also have content restricted. you could go to cable and have no restrictions. not make as much money but have freedom of expression, which almost everybody who works in these mediums wants. >> some of the content truly was, you can't get this anywhere else. >> you're a fantasy maker, the only limit on the kinds of fantasies is people's imagination. >> hbo turned to people who said, i can't do that on television, but you can do it on hbo. >> white people don't trust black people. that's why they won't vote...

>> it was jaw-droppingly violent. it was a men's prison. it probably should be. but, you know, it kind of announces the idea that hbo is going to get very serious about doing scripted dramas. >> it's finished. it's over. >> but hbo really in my mind comes into its own in 1999 with "the sopranos." ♪ ♪ woke up this morning ♪ ♪ got yourself a gun ♪ >> "sopranos" just is one of those shows that was a benchmark of change. it changed a lot of things for everybody. >> throw out the handbook. tony soprano, the lead actor in a drama, he killed a man. we watched him. he took his daughter on a ...

>> because hbo was driven by subscribers and not by commercials and selling advertising time, they had a different way of looking at success or failure. what they were looking for was critical acclaim. >> you've watched letterman, you've watched leno, but what about larry? larry sanders, that is. he's the tv alter ego of comedian garry shandling. >> garry shandling wanted to do a show that deconstructed the kind of show "the tonight show" was. >> just pretend like you're talking to me till we're off the air so it won't seem weird. >> okay. blah, blah, blah, blah. >> "the larry sanders show" wa...

>> you're a fantasy maker, the only limit on the kinds of fantasies is people's imagination. >> hbo turned to people who said, i can't do that on television, but you can do it on hbo. >> white people don't trust black people. that's why they won't vote for no black president. like a black brother will [ bleep ] up the white house. like the grass won't be cut. dishes piled up. cousins running through the white house. cookouts. basketball going in the back. >> in the late '80s hbo was just sort of gaining ground for series. >> by the '90s hbo had started to begin its explosion. >> when we starte...

>> at the end of the '90s, the jig is starting to be up for the networks. basically, quality migrates to cable. >> "oz" comes on in '97. and it's set in this fictional penitentiary. wow. what a strange show that was. >> in "oz," sometimes the things you can't touch are more real than the things you can. for instance, fear, hatred, loneliness, are more real to me than a shank. >> it was jaw-droppingly violent. it was a men's prison. it probably should be. but you know, it kind of announces the idea that hbo is going to get serious about doing scripted dramas. >> it's finished. it's over. >> but...