Sarah Jessica Parker says she panicked when Sex and the City was picked up by HBO: ‘I didn’t want to do a TV show!’

https://ew.com/sarah-jessica-parker-panicked-when-sex-and-the-city-was-picked-up-by-hbo-11733202

15 comments

  1. > But, without the benefit of the hindsight she has now, Parker recalled anxiously asking her agent, ‘Can you get me out of this?’ and even offered to do anything else for HBO if it meant not having to commit to SATC. “I said, ‘I will give my services to HBO to fulfill my contract. So, any movies, I’ll do for X number of years.”

    > However, Parker noted that her agent tried to get her to view the series commitment a little differently. “He said, ‘It can be wonderful. It can be great.’ And the beauty of HBO [at the time] was that it was kind of an unknown species … and [former HBO chairman] Chris Albrecht said, ‘Do it for a year, and if you don’t want to do it anymore, we don’t do it,'” she shared.

  2. Oh no! All those millions you’ll be given that you actually have to work for to earn. It must be terrible.

  3. Need more unimportant news from 30 years ago

    Wow this really blew up. Thank you for the awards everybody. I will try and respond.

    Edit; Added thank you note. Added word “Unimportant” I thought it was in the first time.

  4. The show launched successful careers of both SJP and HBO. Both of them made millions then and are still milking it now. Not like it’s a bad thing.

  5. People need to remember that back in the 90s and even early 2000s TV was viewed as the minor leagues in acting. It was only until shows like SATC, The Wire, Oz, and Sopranos came along that TV started getting recognized for what it could be. Of course you had Friends and Seinfeld and Frasier, 90210 and Save by the Bell that were hits but they were all comedies and really more of a “turn this on to turn my brain off” kind of thing instead of hard hitting, complex storytelling the way movies were. She probably thought her career was going to stall if she worked on SATC, luckily it turned out to be a massive hit and honestly really helped other shows that push boundaries today.

  8. Literally the only thing anyone remembers you for. No offense just fact. It IS her career.

  9. Obviously it’s entirely different these days, but people have to realize that back then, movie stars didn’t star in tv shows: It was often seen as you failing in the big leagues, and being bumped down to the minors.

  11. If I’m not mistaken, the pilot was also horrible and they reshot it a bunch to much better quality for the show that it became.

  12. Chris Albrecht was a visionary. What he did for HBO and then subsequently to Starz was amazing.

  13. Wasnt it Sex In The City?

    Sex And The City sounds wrong…

  14. Either you can say no or you signed a contract that came back to bite your ass. Who gives a shit. You made your bed homie.

  15. Does no one remember Square Pegs? She was already on a great TV show!

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