By BetteAndTinaForever

L-WORD.COM SET VISIT

• Photos
  • Alice's Bedroom
  • Bette's Office
  • Shane and Jenny's House
  • Bette and Tina's Bedroom
  • Bette and Tina's Yard and Pool
• Set Visit Report
• Interview with Pam Grier
• Interview with Rose Troche
• Interview with Cynthia Summer

I should warn you all that though I didn’t get any major spoilers about the storylines, the interviews contain some minor “spoilerly” answers and certain hints about the upcoming Season 6. So, if anyone reading this is a hard-core unspoiled fan, you might skip certain answers, but don’t skip the entire interviews because all three women I talked too are very fascinating professionals and individuals with a lot of great insights about the show and the life outside of it.

Rose Troche came in next. Rose is a director, writer, and a producer for the show, and she’s handling her multiple roles very well. I’ve never talked to her before, but I always admired her as a director. Rose directed and wrote so many great episodes, including the “Pilot”, “Let’s Do it”, “Lawfully” (writer), “Luck, Next Time”, and “Looking Back” from Season One; “Loneliest Number”, “Labyrinth” (writer), “Loud and Proud” from Season 2; and let’s not forget the sizzling “Liquid Heat” episode in Season Five. Do you see the pattern? Most of these episodes are Bette and Tina oriented and we talked a little about it.

B&TF: Rose, maybe you can introduce yourself…

RT: I am Rose Troche. I write, direct, and co-executive produce.

B&TF: How many episodes will you be directing in Season 6?

RT: Three. Three of the last eight.

B&TF: Actually, most of the episodes that you’ve directed, people always praise them a lot. One of the reasons, I think, is because they are sort of Bette and Tina oriented.

RT: Oh yeah! It’s very funny that I end up a lot with Bette and Tina. As a matter of fact, the episode that I’m directing next is a big, big, big Bette & Tina episode.

B&TF: Can you tell me more about it?

RT: (laughing) No, I can’t but that was good…nice try! I think there are people I like to write for as well, so I think I definitely like to write Bette angry. I got to write a couple of things for her where she goes off (laughing).

B&TF: So you directed the episode 509 with the blackout and the elevator scene. Tell me a little about how you came up with this idea of making a sequence when everybody is having sex at the same time.

RT: Well, Ilene Chaiken wrote the script, I came in to direct; and that’s usually what happens and what the process is. We have our first drafts, they’re not first drafts like normal first drafts; they’re actually the result of quite a bit of work. We have the first draft that we publish here, which is probably the result of like three or four drafts prior to that. And then they sort of get tweaked and changed, and we decided to do it as everybody having sex at the same time at the end of the thing because the sex was kind of spread throughout the episode, different places, different times. We decided to sort of have it be all just simultaneous action. And that was really interesting because I’ve done a lot, a lot of sex scenes on this show, as you can imagine over the years (laughing).

B&TF: Some of them were really brilliant.

RT: Oh, thank you. I don’t know if they were mine (laughing) but thank you.

B&TF: Well, as a fan of Bette and Tina, I can say that their scenes were brilliant so if you have done any of them…

RT: Yes, I did.

B&TF: Thank you for that.

RT: Welcome (laughing). Yeah, it was just a hot sweaty episode and I think what was really interesting about that is that I sort of dove into my bag of tricks – because I was like, “How am I going to do seven different sex scenes in one episode? Oh my god. Should I have seven different ways of doing sex in the episodes or something else…what am I going do?” So, basically I just settled on everyone going down on each other (laughing). So it became a scene where people were having sex in kind of the same way, which actually ended up being kind of a real thing for the show because some of the actors who had done sex scenes, had never done that on the show before, so it was really interesting for them to ‘act’ that part. So, it was kind of funny.

B&TF: Did you film each of the scenes at different times and then just edit them in together later?

RT: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah; different days, different times.

B&TF: Because it seemed like some of the scenes were maybe one minute long but how long does it actually take to film scenes like that?

RT: It’s different for each scene. You know when we did the Jenny and Nikki having sex and the crane comes over the log on the set and it comes down and it comes back… that’s pretty much was done in real time, there’s just no cuts in it. So, it takes us the time of rehearsing and then every time we do a sex scene, I take the actors aside and rehearse them where we’re going to do the sex scene, or I’ll take them to a different set and privately go through whatever it is they need to do… the things I want to have happen in this kind of time…and they become actually very mechanical. Just for a comfort level, I can just break it down into steps, like when I say, “One - put your hand on her breast”. It helps them have a structure in which to work. I think when I directed the Pilot, I sort of made the mistake, and it really was a directorial mistake, to allow people to have a little bit of wine and let the camera run ,and it really puts it all on the actors to have to figure things out. And that can get a little awkward, so what I started doing very shortly after that was very choreographed sex scenes.

B&TF: I also read that the Pilot scene between Bette and Tina when they start reconnecting – it started out being very short but the Showtime executives wanted to make it longer.

RT: Yeah, that was a whole discussion about it. I remember I was on the set shooting that day when I got a phone call from Gary Levine (executive VP of original programming at Showtime) and I said, “Well, what exactly do you want? You want a sex scene?” He was like, “No, no. I don’t want a sex scene.” And I told him, “You want a sex scene, you want more so you want a sex scene.” And so, whatever, we argued over semantics. He said he wanted more of a connection. I’m like, “I think we have a connection, you want a sex scene” (laughing). And, we went back and did that sex scene and it’s the one I’m very, very proud of, it’s the one between Bette and Tina in the Pilot.

B&TF: Fans are still talking about it.

RT: Yes, I think that’s one of my favorite sex scenes. And that was the very first time that I counted down to orgasm. Because they were like, “What do you want, do you want an orgasm?” So I was like, “Ten, nine, eight…”, which is very funny because we had to remove my talking, which is hard because we had to reconstruct breathing, because they’re actually breathing heavily. And I’m in the background going, “Five, four…”. But it gave them some directions because otherwise, they’re not doing it in time. They’re such professionals that they gave it all. I particularly like working with the two of them because they really commit. I think Jennifer and Laurel really commit to being like, “Okay, we are playing partners in a long term relationship who are now back together and are trying to commit to a life together. And you know that to commit to a life together you have to really make an effort to continue to have sex.” That’s one of the things that lesbians sometimes don’t (laughing).

B&TF: Yes, I actually asked Ilene to make Bette and Tina having sex in each episode in season 6. Will my wish be granted?

RT: (loud laughter) I don’t know if once in each episode (laughing, again).

B&TF: Well, you know, Season 5 everyone was waiting for them to reconnect and get back together, and in Episode 506, the second scene between Bette and Tina was sort of reminiscent of the Pilot sex scene. It was the same exact…

RT: Yes, as a matter of fact, Ilene directed that and I think that you’d have to ask her but I think her plan was to redo The Sex scene which, I remember seeing it, is basically the same shot. I asked about it, and I think that it was really reminiscent of that very first scene because it was about them really reconnecting again and that was a really potent love scene and she wanted to help them back to what that was. It was premeditated, as far as I know. It was a very premeditated kind of decision on her part.

B&TF: Some people were saying Ilene was just recycling some old ideas but when I first saw it I thought of the Pilot right away and for me it was just wonderful because they were reconnecting then and they were reconnecting now and it’s not just about sex anymore.

RT: Right. And I don’t want to speak for Ilene, but I think that was, from my point of view as the viewer, the familiarity of when you know someone and you get back together with them. When you’re with someone for a long time, you pull out your A list of your favorite sexual moments with that someone. You have a repertoire, and then you pull from that repertoire to be re-familiar. These are two people, who’ve had a lot of sex with other people in the interim, then they come back together and you’ll need to discuss these things. Sometimes there are all of these new tricks, like “Now you kiss different, where did that come from? That must have come from Helena or that came from here and something doesn’t feel right.” And they were really connecting in a serious way of getting back together, and I think they pulled from their repertoire of sort of sexual moves or whatever it is, of what was good for them. So that’s why I think she made that. That wasn’t a recycling; it was a very conscious thing.

B&TF: So do you think your personal favorite characters to write are Bette and Tina?

RT: Oh! I love writing Alice. She’s just wonderful; her delivery is so funny and just to write comedy is so much fun.

B&TF: Most of the writing – where does it come from. Everyone contributes or how is it done?

RT: Well, we all write our own scripts and Ilene writes the majority. Ilene will almost always take a pass on everyone’s script. She’s the Executive Producer, all the rest of us – Angela, Elizabeth, and I are all Co-Executive Producers. So, we don’t really re-write each other’s work, our scripts go to Ilene, then they go to the network, and they go back to Ilene; you know that kind of thing.

B&TF: The network also has to approve them?

RT: Absolutely, but they’re very hands-off on this show. I think it’s a very dreamy job. We were talking the other night, I was talking to Angela (Robinson) and just saying that it’s a very funny show, because it doesn’t set you up at all like for network TV where everyone’s breathing down your neck. They’re very respectful, and they’ll give their notes, but they’re never really that huge or severe; and then we just adjust for their notes. It’s sort of a mutual respect; they don’t get up in our stuff so much. Ilene handles that part as well.

B&TF: You know there are some viewers who would analyze every second of the show and would point out that something is inconsistent, this is not how it happened in Season 1, etc. So, is it because you have all these different directors who sometimes don’t know what happened in the previous season or because of so many different writers?

RT: No. You know what? In Seasons 1 through 3 we really did change writers a little bit more, more than we needed to; we could have settled on the same writers a bit more. I think we thought we needed to have a male writer on the show, which we really ended up not having to have, and it took us a while to figure out, to not feel bad that it was all women, you know what I mean? Because this show really is all about women. So, I think some of it does come from different directors. It’s a really great show for a director to work on. I mean, having worked on other people’s shows where there’s much more of a firm hand, we do allow people to bring their vision. We do want that from directors; we want them to bring in their creativity and really give us their best. In order to do that, we give them a little bit of latitude, and I think sometimes that does give us things that are maybe slightly uneven in tone, occasionally. But I think that it’s gotten better that way. I mean, I know that there are some super die-hard fans. And it’s hard because there’s just stuff that we do want to have happen and because of something that previously happened, we’re like – “No, we shouldn’t but…” sometimes we do it.

B&TF: Can you give me an example?

RT: You know, it’s really funny, nothing’s coming to mind right now. But I think we do have a little bit of play sometimes with reality.

B&TF: Well, one example, in Season 3 when Alice and Dana were breaking up in the beginning of one episode it said, “Month and a half ago” and then next episode starts with the same scene, they are still breaking up but it said, “Month ago”, making it look like it took them that long to break up.

RT: Oh, it had to be a joke. That was just a joke as in – “How long does it take a lesbian to break-up?” (laughing) Sometimes I think the inconsistency is seen by people who don’t understand our humor. We’re just trying to be funny. That’s just making fun of lesbians. It’s like, “Come on, folks, let’s speed it up.” It should have been like a year and a month later, still breaking up, then people would have gotten it.

B&TF: Well, just like in Season 5 when Bette says, “Some lesbians, you have to break up with them twice...”

RT: Yeah, yeah. It takes a while for it to stick sometimes.

B&TF: So, right now you’re shooting episode 603, right?

RT: Yes, 603. Angela’s shooting 603. I just got done shooting 602, and I’m shooting the next one.

B&TF: Yes, I will let fans know to watch episode 604 for more Bette and Tina.

RT: Yeah, yeah.

B&TF: What was the most challenging thing for you working on The L Word for the past 5-6 years?

RT: The most challenging thing, I think for me, it’s getting into the LA vibe. I’m an East Coast person. For me it’s the “LA thing”. I live part time in LA, but when I’m there, it’s very different; the women are very different, the lesbians are very different on the East Coast. I live in New York, so I think it’s always been the biggest challenge to put myself into a Los Angeles mentality because I’m so deeply East Coast. We just have a slightly different community there. It’s a little less fashion forward. It’s a little less fancy, let’s put it that way (laughing).

B&TF: And what’s been the most rewarding thing?

RT: Oh, I think it’s just been tremendously rewarding to be on a show during one of the worst administrations in the US in decades. So, to be working on a show like this and to feel subversive in such a ridiculously conservative time and at a moment when I feel like church and state are not separate, that they’re really just combining.

So, it’s felt good to feel like a rebel. I felt tremendously proud to be a part of the first show. I feel like, after “Go Fish” and other things in my career, it feels like something totally natural to continue to represent the lesbian community in such a way. And I’m very proud of that.

B&TF: Speaking of “Go Fish”, I talked to Guinevere Turner at a convention and she mentioned the sequel…

RT: She just wrote me!! I just got an email from her. She said, “Send me the notes, I feel like working on it. We’ll see if we can get through it without fighting.”

B&TF: Is it still in writing or in pre-production?

RT: No. It’s not in pre-production at all, are you kidding? No, no, no, no… We keep on having philosophical differences on the tone of the film. I don’t want the film to be bitter and angry, but I think Guin thinks that would be ‘funny’. If you look at the first “Go Fish”, I think it would be a disservice to make a “Go Fish Two” that bitter and angry. It is excruciatingly difficult to watch the first one, by the way, because I was barely a filmmaker back then. I used weird angles…it was super clunky. We hadn’t watched it in eleven years, and we all got together in Paris. It was V.S. (Brody), who plays Ely in the movie, Guin who plays Max, of course, and who co-wrote and co-produced it, and myself. V.S. has lived in France for almost 10 years now. We were sitting in her apartment, and it was afternoon and we opened up a bottle of wine, and it was like – “OK, let’s stick it in the DVD player.” And I was like, “Oh my god, this is excruciating.”

B&TF: You probably needed more than one bottle of wine…

RT: Yes, I think we did go through like two bottles of wine. By the end, I actually had tears in my eyes. There’s something so extraordinarily special that cuts through all the awkwardness, and there’s sincerity there, and I looked up and said, “God, it’s like fifteen years later and look at us; we’re like a bunch of old hags now.” And I think we need to tap into some hope that we may still have. I want it to be a film about the families that we make and the families we create. And it’s going to be all the same people who are still in each other’s lives; just like we are. It really is the real life thing that happens. We made this movie together and most of us are still very close.

BT: What can you tell to the fans now that the show is going to be over?

RT: Oh. Don’t worry, fans. It’s never over. It will live on in some way. You know, they just announced the spin-off and though we don’t know who it will be…just hold it together. And, if not that, I think that these things inevitably work in such a way that we’ll see more. It’s funny but I think that the lesbian characters are still not out there. You’re more likely to see the gay male character but the lesbian characters haven’t permeated television in such a way. We had ER, for one, and just for one second we have, what is it? Lipstick Jungle?

B&TF: Well, there’s Cashmere Mafia?

RT: Right, Cashmere Mafia but it was cancelled…anyway.

Rose and I ran out of time, but I thanked her for talking with me. We will all look forward to the sequel to “Go Fish!”