Interview with TV writer Liz Tigelaar, creator of "Life Unexpected" - Part 13: The Bitter Questions

Part 1 - Breaking in as an assistant
Part 2 - First Staff Writer Job on "American Dreams"
Part 3 - How Do I Get an Agent?
Part 4 - Selling a Pilot
Part 5 - Personal Themes in Writing
Part 6 - Genesis of "Life Unexpected"
Part 7 - First-Time Showrunner
Part 8 - Developing the second year of LUX
Part 9 - Dealing with network notes
Part 10 - Controversial LUX storylines
Part 11 - LUX lives on
Part 12 - Network overall deal, working on Once Upon a Time and Revenge

I confess, I'm a big fan of Inside the Actor's Studio.  It's my goal with these interviews to hopefully explore the craft of writing as well as James Lipton probes his subjects on the craft of acting.  To that end, I plan on concluding each interview with "The Bitter Questions," a series of serious and silly questions that will hopefully allow the writers to reveal something unexpected about themselves.

This segment also has what might be my favorite moment from Liz Tigelaar.  See if you can guess what it is.


And that's a wrap on Liz Tigelaar!  I hope you enjoyed this interview as much as I did.  Huge thanks goes out to Liz for being so generous with her time AND being willing to put up with being interviewed by a puppet.  You can follow Liz on Twitter at @LizTigelaar.

Also, I highly recommend two Nerdist podcasts on which Liz appears.  There's a little bit of overlap in the discussions there and in this interview, but because I'd heard one of these and saw a report on the other before I interviewed Liz, I made a conscious effort to not ask Liz too many of the same questions.

This podcast also features writers Robert Hewitt Wolfe (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Alphas) and Dana Gould (The Simpsons.)  There's a lot of great writing insight, but also a lot of funny moments among the group too.  It's an hour and twenty minutes, but it feels like half that.

Meanwhile, this podcast is a recording of a panel from the ATX Television Festival earlier this year and in addition to Liz, it features Jane Espenson (Once Upon a Time; Husbands; BSG; Buffy) and Erica Messer (showrunner, Criminal Minds).  The topic: "Women on TV."  Yes, they wade into the issue of gender politics in Hollywood.