I got the feeling: It's time to do a Marco Polo story. I felt like everything was lining up right because long-form television series were becoming to me like the new great American novel.
I feel that Marco Polo has really been misrepresented - has never really gotten his due.
Marco Polo has been kind of buried under this cloud of rather banal historical dust, when the true story is so much more exciting.
The journey of Marco Polo is the hero's journey, one that all cultures across the globe can relate to.
In 2007, I did a horseback trip across part of central Mongolia with my 13-year-old son - we encountered Marco Polo at all these historical places where Mongolian nomads would reference his accounts and his relationship with Kublai Khan.