This One's A Screamer! A Review of "Scream 4"

What’s your favourite scary movie? Is it Halloween? You know, the one with the guy with the white mask who just sort of walks around and stalks the baby-sitters? Or is it A Nightmare On Elm Street? The one where the guy had knives for fingers? Or, is it Scream? The definitive postmodern horror where the characters were very much self-aware they were in a movie? Whatever the case, its undeniable Scream influenced a number of less favourable slasher movies and now, almost fifteen years after the original, Scream 4 has finally arrived to seemingly mixed reviews. If you have not yet seen this movie you may be wondering; is it as sharp and cutting as its predecessors? Or, is it simply yet another dumb movie and a painful reminder of the rotting state of the contemporary horror genre?

The appeal of the original Scream movies is they’re not your typical scary movies wherein a silent, unstoppable superhuman killer meaninglessly slays dumb, shallow, oversexed, intoxicated teenagers portrayed by unknown actors. Written by The Vampire Diaries Executive producer, Kevin Williamson, and directed by A Nightmare on Elm Street creator and proclaimed ‘master of suspense’, Wes Craven, 1996’s Scream completely deconstructed the clichés of the slasher subgenre, mercilessly satirizing it, and yet cunningly conforming to a few of its conventions. Scream is set in a world not dissimilar to our own with recognisable existing horror movies, and so when a slick killer, known as Ghostface, starts slicing and dicing the students of Woodsboro High, the characters use their preconceived knowledge of these horror movies in order to survive their ordeal. The casting of such high profile actors as Drew Barrymore and Henry Winkler, and rising stars Neve Campbell, Courtney Cox, David Arquette, Jamie Kennedy, Rose McGowan, Mathew Lillard, Skeet Ulrich and Liev Schreiber, stamped Scream with a difference to the slew of flagging horror movies from the late 1980s to the mid 1990s. One moment it would have you laughing at the subtle in-jokes, the next you would be on the edge of your seat with terror. Then there’s Ghostface, himself an amalgamation of prior iconic horror movie antagonists. He fashions a terrifying mask similarly to Leatherface, Michael Myers and Jason Vorhees of their respective Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Halloween and Friday the 13th franchises, yet unlike them he is not mute. Voiced eerily to perfection by Roger L. Jackson, Ghostface projects as much charismatic flare as A Nightmare on Elm Street’s Freddy Krueger, when he torments his victims with life-or-death scary movie trivia questions via the phone. The changing of identities underneath the mask in each subsequent film is what also differentiates Ghostface from all the rest. In each film it’s a different person or people utilising the mask to conceal their identity, so each Scream movie entices an air of mystery, compelling audiences to guess who are the perpetrators? And who are the victims? Craven and Williamson returned with the 1997 follow-up Scream 2, which successfully upped the ante with more scares, more laughs, more movie references and more big name stars. Whereas 2000’s Scream 3, also directed by Craven, but this time penned by Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen scribe Ehren Kruger, became so painfully tongue-in-cheek with in-jokes and contained less horror movie references that it appeared to become what the series initially set out to stab at, almost just another ordinary horror movie.

So, over a decade has passed and Craven is reunited with Williamson providing most of the script, and Ehren Kruger for additional rewrites, to unearth the Scream series in a bid, like the original, to resuscitate the decaying horror genre. But what’s the focus this time? Scream already cut through the horror movie, Scream 2 – the horror sequel, and Scream 3 was the generic trilogy. This time around, in the most original idea since, well – the original, Scream 4 hacks away at Hollywood’s recent trend of remakes. The stylized title 'SCRE4M' is an evident statement that by substituting the ‘4’ in place of the ‘A’ this film satirizes the remake but is in fact a genuine continuation from the previous three films. Also up for slaughtering is the ‘torture porn’ subgenre the industry has become accustomed to with the Saw franchise, which compensates genuine suspense with tactless gore. And whereas the original movie incorporated the telephone as a new age weapon, Scream 4 explores the dangers of social network messaging, mobile phone technology and internet videos. Surely, with its attention transfixed on the remake and, in this case, a similar story to the first Scream movie, there’s an expected danger that, like Scream 3, Scream 4’s self-referential satire could collapse the franchise and bury it for good? Not so. Scream 4 now overshadows Scream 3 as the funniest entry. However, the humour comes instead from the characters focus on one another or generally the conventions of the scary movie, akin to the original, whilst the homages to the first film are actually cleverly replicated at various points – but with a difference. A direct example sees one teen girl attempting to crawl away from the new Ghostface killer in her garage. If you’ve seen 1996’s Scream you’ll remember that Rose McGowan’s character, Tatum Riley, is in a similar situation and suffers a gruesome fate when she becomes stuck in a dog door embedded in to the garage door and thus leaving her neck to crush as she rises, colliding with the roof of the garage. This time, the garage door is already open, yet the killer closes it, crushing on to the new girl’s spine. The result is, whilst the first film challenges your expectations of the standard horror film, the fourth intricately challenges your expectations of how it’ll execute similar scenarios to the first Scream. The self-referencing only adds to the suspense rather than the humour. This might be effective viewing for Scream fans, and can still serve as enthralling to newer audiences, however part of Scream 4’s charm is inwardly looking back on the suspense of the previous movies. Thus it is more aimed at the fans of the earlier films.

Living up to the standards of the original trilogy, and to mirror characters from the first movie, Scream 4 introduces a fresh array of established stars and new talents – as more lambs to the slaughter. The intended new star of the franchise is portrayed by Emma Roberts, daughter of Eric Roberts, and niece of Julia Roberts. Her character – Jill Roberts – is the young cousin of former Scream tortured protagonist Sidney Prescott, portrayed once more by Neve Campbell. Also returning are real-life estranged couple Courtney Cox and David Arquette in their respective roles as ambitious journalist Gale Weathers and goofy Deputy Dwight ‘Dewey’ Riley. Accompanying Roberts and the series’ regulars as a handful of potential Ghostface suspects and victims are Heroes star Hayden Panettiere, Signs actor and brother of Macaulay Culkin, Rory Culkin, Saw II’s Erik Knudsen, Grindhouse’s Marley Shelton, Battlestar Gallactica’s Mary McDonnell, Community’s Alison Brie, The O.C.’s Adam Brody, Anthony Anderson of Scary Movie 3 and Scary Movie 4, and up-and-coming stars Nico Tortorella and Marielle Jaffe. And if that wasn’t enough, expect some painfully humorous and shockingly terrifying guest appearances from Veronica Mars star Kristen Bell, True Blood and X-Men actress Anna Paquin, Pretty Little Liars’ Lucy Hale, 90210’s Shanae Grimes, Friday Night Lights’ Aimee Teegarden, and Britt Robertson of Dan in Real Life. Scream 4 certainly sports an all-star cast to generate enough buzz to match the earlier Scream movies, however a number of these talents sadly fall underused, merely sacrificed to Ghostface just as they arouse suspicion. As every Scream movie starts with the suspenseful murder of a high profile character or actor we won’t spoil who snuffs it first – or how. All that needs to be said is it effectively relieves you of your anxious laughing with a few hilarious moments which bare similarities to the movie-within-a-movie setup of Scream 2, before mercilessly offing some defenceless young characters in as tragic an ordeal as the first Scream did to Drew Barrymore. And then there’s the identity of the killer and the final scenes which is a genius cynical statement about Hollywood’s reliability on remakes and the expectations of the passing of the baton between this series’ surviving trio and the array of new characters. With so many stars appearing in Scream 4 there’s no obvious guarantee which one is the prime suspect in contrast to Scream 2’s Laurie Metcalf. And with Campbell’s role significantly not as reduced as it was in Scream 3, the big reveal and backstory don’t appear as thinly stretched and inconceivable. Thus the final act of Scream 4 is as finely executed as the first Scream.

With the focus primarily being on recapturing the story and essence of the first Scream with the inclusion of a larger, newer cast, does the plot develop from where Scream 3 left off? Or, despite its different take on familiar situations, is Scream 4 simply retracing old ground and setting up further instalments for the newer characters? Rest assured, with the long-awaited return of Sidney, Gale and Dewey the plot expands on their roles since we last saw them a decade earlier. Scream 3 finished with Gale and Dewey reuniting as a couple and becoming engaged, having seen their romance initiate in Scream, and blossom in Scream 2 before an amicable break-up prior to the third film due in part to Gale’s burning ambition to become a successful Hollywood reporter. This time around, it’s Dewey who’s career has advanced as he has become Sheriff of Woodsboro since settling down to married life, whereas Gale is utterly bored and dissatisfied with her marriage and her life. With the couple’s relationship strained further with the presence of flirty Deputy Judy Hicks (Shelton) working alongside Dewey, and Gale’s burning ambition to revitalise her ‘tarnished brand’ with the assistance of high school movie geeks Charlie and Robbie (Knudsen and Culkin), Dewey and Gale effectively spend less time with one another and more time integrating with the newer characters. And then there’s Sidney who was convinced the nightmares were at last behind her after Scream 3, that she literally left the door open - a big deal, given the past traumas she’d endured. After discovering her mother’s raped and mutilated body; wrongfully accusing her mother’s lover of the deed; having a book published about said murder; witnessing her high school friends slain around her; being pressurised in to losing her virginity to a psychopath; accepting her mother was adulterous; having another book published in addition to a movie being made about her prior ordeals; the murders of her college friends; trust issues with her college sweetheart and his subsequent death; and the mental torture from sadistic Tarantino fan, Mickey (Timothy Olyphant), is it any wonder that by film 3 she was living as a recluse, in isolation, adopting an alias and working as a phone operator for women’s crisis counselling? Well, as implied at the end of Scream 3, Sidney has overcome her trepidations and has reinvented herself as a confident survivor by publishing a self-help book titled ‘Out of Darkness’. Coincidentally, or a deliberate PR stunt by her publisher, Rebecca Walters (Brie), the last stop of Sid’s book tour is at her home town of Woodsboro on the anniversary of the initial murders where she stays with her young cousin Jill (Roberts) and maternal aunt Kate (McDonnell). By directly drawing Sidney in to Jill’s world it makes Jill all the more relatable and likeable as a new intended franchise carrier.

So moving on, who’s out to get Jill and Sidney? Could it be Jill’s creepy ex-boyfriend Trevor (Tortorella) who’s fascinatingly similar to Skeet Ulrich’s killer Billy Loomis of the first movie? Could it be either – or even both – of the new film geeks in contrast to Jamie Kennedy’s original geek Randy Meeks? What of Jill’s best friends Kirby (Panettiere) and/or Olivia (Jaffe) as a difference to Rose McGowan’s Tatum character? Or Deputy Hicks who fascinates over Dewey, dislikes Gale and went to Woodsboro High with Sidney? Or the two buddy cops with distinct TV and film knowledge, Hoss and Perkins (Brody and Perkins)? The suspects and victims are plenty meaning you can expect yet more suspense and humour, but also in light of the recent torture porn phase, more gore! The death scenes are not as elaborate or confusing as say the Saw franchise, rather in keeping with the Scream series, they’re pretty basic stabbing assaults – only with a wickedly gory humour at times.

All in all, Scream 4 is a highly entertaining slasher movie certainly worthier than the recent spew of remakes and torture porn it satirizes. Craven and Williamson expand on the roles of the three primary survivors of the original trilogy and successfully correlate their stories with a larger, newer generation for Ghostface to pick off making Scream 4 both a starting ground for newer audiences and more so a direct continuation of the series for Scream fans. The multitalented recognisable cast are fresh and welcome additions which embody the exact cutting edge idealism the first two Scream movies evoked. Additionally, whilst their celebrity status is on a par this means no star was evidently picked to portray the opening scene victims or the killer. This combined with an original story heavily based on the original movie, yet with unexpected plot twists and comprising new media technology furthermore rejuvenates the Scream franchise and somewhat restores faith in the horror genre. Let’s hope if the rumoured Scream 5 and Scream 6 happen the series will continue to be imaginative, scary, funny and clever. Akin to the innovative original movie, almost fifteen years earlier, “It all began with a scream over 9-1-1 and ended in a bloodbath that has rocked the town of Woodsboro,” - and its audiences alike.

An "Angel" Retrospective with Tim Minear

This interview was conducted on July 30, 2007.

Tim Minear worked on Angel for four out of its five seasons, penning such seminal episodes as "Are You Now or Have You Ever Been", "Reprise" and "Lullaby". Here he reflects on his time on the show.

Pasha: In the past you’ve mentioned that you initially refused the job to write for Angel several times. What was the reason for this and what made you eventually change your mind?

Tim Minear: When Angel came along, I’d started to make a bit of a name for myself. Well, that is to say, I was no longer begging for work and there were some other options. Also, I’m notorious for saying no before I say yes. Sometimes I say no even after I say yes. I just wasn’t sure. The thing that made me finally say yes was something Howard Gordon said to me: “You should always try to work with people who you think you can learn something from. You should be with Joss.” Howard wasn’t the first person show said I should be working with Joss Whedon. Others had been saying it to me long before I’d seen Buffy or met Joss. Back when I was doing The X-Files people were saying it to me. They were right.

P: Beginning with the first season you wrote many of the key episodes such as Doyle’s death, the key flashback episodes and the majority of the second season arc. Forgive the wording, but what was the reason for this?

TM: I can’t forgive the wording. Why me, or why at all? Me because... lucky I guess? I was the only guy -- the only new guy -- that stuck. Because a lot of the heavy lifting at first was done by Buffy writers, the new Angel writers were kind of red-headed step children at first at that shop. By the time the other new kids had fallen away, I was about the only original “exclusive to Angel” guy left, so in a way I was the only “actual” Angel guy in those early days. I guess since Angel was my only focus, I got to burrow my way deeper into its DNA than some others. Also, if you plan to stay in the game, you have to want the ball. I wanted the ball. I took the ball.

P: Looking at the episodes you’ve written, it seems you have an affinity with some characters in particular. Angel, Kate and Darla especially. Was there anything about these characters that appealed and you related to or was it just luck that you wrote many of their pivotal episodes?

TM: A bit of both. I knew we couldn’t compete with what Buffy and Angel had as a couple. Darla was a bit of an enigma, and therefore one could take more liberties with creating something new. I saw that we could do something that in no way stepped on Buffy but was unique to Angel. It would always be hard on the legacy of Buffy to say “Angel met someone new!” But, our show wasn’t called “Buffy” it was called “Angel.” One had to first and foremost service THAT character. We had to find a way to give the writers on Angel room to move without everything being about Buffy -- but while still respecting everything that came before. So how do you give your titular character a relationship without saying “Oh, and that deathless one-of-a-kind romance you saw on Buffy is now null, ‘cause we need some good shit for our new show, too”? Well, the way to give him a complicated romance that didn’t discount Buffy was to make it an OLD relationship. Something that pre-dated Buffy. And when your guy is more than two hundred years old, there’re places to go for that. Angel and Darla are every bit as one-of-a-kind as Angel and Buffy -- but not the same nor in competition. I always saw them as a combo of George and Martha from “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf?” and Bonnie and Clyde. Buffy and Angel were so epic because it was so pure but so doomed. Angel and Darla were, for me, epic because it was so corrupt and so doomed. Darla and Angel are in many ways the negative image of Buffy and Angel.

I always liked Kate because, like me in those early days, she was an outsider trying to get a handle on this insular, magical world. Also she was Mulder and Scully rolled into one, and I never felt like I got enough of a chance to work out my X-Files fetish while I was on that show.

P: Did you have further plans for Kate had Elisabeth Rohm not left for Law and Order? One rumor was that the character of Justine was created to replace her.

TM: I don’t recall. I think we’d taken her as far as we needed to. But I’m sure had she been available we would have found reasons to bring her back.

P: What was the original ending for season two intended to be had Julie Benz and Christian Kane been available?

TM: I have to be honest. I know that some people recall Pylea as a reaction to those actors not being available. I remember it differently. I could be wrong. I remember that we were sitting around and thinking about the next few episodes and we were all a little weary of the Darla drama and someone said, “can’t we just do something totally unexpected and go to Oz?” And we did. Now, it may be that they weren’t available and we still planned on telling that beige Angel arc without those characters and that’s when the “Oz” of it was mentioned, but I don’t remember it that way.

P: Before Charisma Carpenter fell pregnant, what were the plans going to be for season four? I understand Cordelia was still going to be evil -- would this still have led to a similar Jasmine arc, what would Cordy’s motives have been?

TM: It was still going to be Cordy as big bad, if I recall, but it would have built to a throw down between Angel and Cordelia. But because of Charisma’s pregnancy, we made Cordelia pregnant too and had her “give birth” to an actress who wasn’t laboring (sorry for the pun) under a medical condition. But before we made that choice, there was even talk of shooting the Angel/Cordy battle scenes early in the year... but the idea of getting far enough ahead on breaking stories so we’d know exactly what those scenes needed to be turned out to be a pipe dream.

P: Along these lines, I have to ask if there were ever plans to bring Doyle back in any capacity?

TM: Every once in a while I’d bring it up -- but I’d get shot down. Rightfully so. I thought Doyle would have been a great Big Bad for season three. But the problems and demons that the actor wrestled with in the real world, which in the end took his life, ruled that out as an option.

P: Prior to its airing, I read you were pleased with the script for “That Old Gang of Mine” -- yet the pleased went away once it was produced. What changed?

TM: No. I always pretty much always loathed that script. But I felt, weak as the script was, that had it been shot differently that it would have made a huge difference. As it happened, it was my weakest script coupled with the most unfocused direction. Just painful all the way around.

P: Angel famously changed tone and was reinvented a lot, especially after season one when Los Angeles became less of a character and the ensemble dynamic changed. Was the WB responsible for this or was it something that the writers felt was necessary?

TM: Joss and David at first thought we’d be doing a stand alone procedural show. When they saw “Eternity” and realized that when the guest cast member (good as she was) fell out and it became about our people, it all changed. In the end, we started writing to our and the show’s strengths -- and no one argued.

P: Likewise, was the lightened tone of the show and Angel’s character at the beginning of season three, which coincided with the Cordelia pairing and arrival of baby Connor, a network mandate or was it a creative decision designed to magnify the effects of “Sleep Tight”?

TM: We’d get network notes in those first four years, but the creative direction was always Joss and us. We always looked to him and he pretty much never looked to anyone else.

P: After killing several characters you earned the monicker of the Tim Reaper and you’ve since joked about killing people off on your later shows. Did you actively set out to kill characters in Angel or was it just a thing you did that unbeknownst to you developed into a pattern?

TM: Somehow I’d end up with some of the big, pivotal moments. And in those moments, people die.

P: How did the storybreaking process evolve as the show shifted from its anthology format to the more arc heavy, serialized format?

TM: Frankly, the biggest change was that I was more involved. It was Joss, David and me for a lot of it. Then as we started building our staff and adding people who stuck, it would be the whole room, or permutations of various combinations. Sometimes just me and Joss, sometimes Jeff Bell and I, etc.

P: Incidentally what format did you prefer -- MOTW or arcs -- and why?

TM: Arcs. When the show started feeling like a novel and you couldn’t wait to get to the next chapter it rang like a gong. However, every once in a while when I’d get to do something like “Are You Now or Have You Ever Been...” it would be my inner gong that got rung. So that’s deeply personal on a different level, being able to indulge in a delicious just-for-me treat.

P: What are your thoughts on the academic study devoted to Angel? How much focus was placed on symbolism, social commentary, gender politics and the many other things discussed in these papers when you were breaking the stories?

TM: For me, virtually none. It’s almost all I can ever do just to make a story track and not be boring. If something makes me go “eww, that might be offensive” I try to compensate. But mostly, I just wanna spin a corker of a tale.

P: Were there ever any stories you wanted to tell and never got the chance to?

TM: Yeah. But then they pretty much got told later by other people once I left, so it’s all good.

P: Chances are you know now, but when the series ended what ideas had you come up with for what happened after the alley?

TM: Well, Jaye was going to be considered a messiah, and then Sharon... see, I was doing Wonderfalls by then and didn’t spend a whole lot of time breaking stories for a show I hadn’t been on in a year.

P: Finally, do you foresee yourself returning to the Angelverse in any of its incarnations in the future?

TM: I’d love to. I just adore Angel.

INTERVIEW: A "Buffy" Retrospective with Marti Noxon

This interview was originally conducted on September 11th, 2007.

 

Marti Noxon was recently kind enough to take time out from running Private Practice to do an interview with me. During it we talked about Buffy, Grey’s Anatomy and Point Pleasant as well as what it’s like to be a showrunner.

Pasha: How’s Private Practice going? 

Marti Noxon: It’s been good. It’s been very busy. The first year of any show is a lot of work. A lot of late nights. But it’s good people, really good people. 

P: And as a spin-off of Grey’s Anatomy, how much of a challenge has it been differentiating the themes and the tone from the parent show? 

MN: Well… one of the good things about it is, I think the tone is very similar in a way. It has the same comedy/melodrama ratio. But it has a similar ratio as Grey’s. But it’s easy to differentiate because the actors are so much more mature and they’re at a different place in life. So in terms of differentiating the shows, the feeling of the show is quite different. And we do a lot of locations and they’re out of the office a lot and that’s really not the case on Grey’s. 

P: And is it different working on something like Grey’s and Private Practice, which are quite mainstream in their appeal, as opposed to Buffy and Point Pleasant? 

MN: Yeah, it is different. I mean the level of public scrutiny, especially when I was on Grey’s, I couldn’t believe – especially the amount of press we were getting. So, yeah, it does feel different – there’s an immediate response to everything we’re doing. Whereas, with Buffy you could fly under the radar. Those are two very different experiences. From what I understand Point Pleasant was more popular in international.
 

P: I know they were all shown here in the UK. 

MN: We really didn’t get a response with Point Pleasant. It just sort of petered away. But yeah, this is just constantly, constantly hearing articles both about the show and on set stuff. So yeah, you feel more scrutinized. 

P: And is writing Private Practice different than writing genre shows? 

MN: Yes and no. Although I said to Shonda [Rhimes] when I started working on Grey’s that in a weird way Grey’s is strangely not based in reality either and that the doctors are based in their own superhero world. Tonally, it doesn’t feel based in the real world. It feels like a magical space and the doctors, a lot like on Buffy, have these twisted personal lives and then they jump into superhero mode and they save people. So in a weird way I feel the most in my comfort zone since I left Buffy. That tone shift between the very dramatic and the very light. And then these characters are doing something and have a mission. The hardest thing for me on Point Pleasant was I couldn’t figure out who was on what side and for me the show didn’t come to life until we started leading into the fact the girl was evil but by then it was too late. But Private Practice, in a weird way doesn’t feel that much different. 

P: What are the challenges of writing shows that incorporate genre elements and shows that don’t? 

MN: Shonda is a huge Buffy fan, which is why she was eager to have someone from that show help her out and we talk about both shows often and the contrasts and stuff. And she jokingly said to me the other day, “we should make them all really superheroes, we should make the doctors all have alter egos and fly around.” And I said “no, don’t,” ‘cause one of the things I like about working on a show that is not a genre show is that the rules and boundaries are a lot more defined and that the rules and limitlessness of the genre show and the fact that it can only be confined by your imagination can be really, really overwhelming. You can feel completely stuck because you have to just top yourself over and over again and also so many things are just old genre tropes. Here, you’ve got your old medical show clichés but you can’t avoid them so you just try and write them better. 

P: Okay, now some Buffy questions… You started off as a writer and then you became a showrunner at the beginning of season six… 

MN: Yeah, I got promoted to an executive producer and the reality is I was already doing a lot of stuff that I did on season six before, but I got credit for it. And people also thought that meant Joss [Whedon] wasn’t around and that just wasn’t the case. He was very much around. 

P: So, as a showrunner what were your favorite parts of the job? Overseeing production, editing or did you still favor writing? 

MN: I think that that job for me, aside from the fact that there is just a lot of pressure, is the most fun because you do a variety of things. You’re you’re managing a staff of writers and you’re talking to the actors and you’re involved in production. But the problem is that it’s kinda just too much for a normal person. One non-Joss person. You kinda just feel overwhelmed and it’s very taxing. Private Practice is a good situation and the Buffy situation was great as those responsibilities are often shared. 

P: A friend of mine told me this, which I did not know, but apparently Joss once said you were Zoe to his Malcolm Reynolds. Can you elaborate on that? 

MN: That seems about right. I was faithful and devoted and I worked on the engine a lot, but he often had to tell me what was broke. 

P: Okay, back to Buffy, because this is apparently a very schizophrenic interview… I noticed in Buffy, and this hasn’t been mentioned in many interviews, that the tone of the show changed from season to season. Like season seven had a very earthy feel. How much of that is you and the writers deciding what tone you want and how much comes down to production? 

MN: And how much of it is unconscious? I mean so much of it is where you’re at in relationship to your own creative process; each other; the actors; where you’re at in your life. The outside culture bleeds in. In terms of what’s going on in the world, I think we all went to a relatively dark place after Columbine and 9/11. I’ll never forget the day, 9/11, going down to the set and telling people to leave and driving through the streets. I mean we’d been joking about the apocalypse for years but suddenly it felt more real than a joke. So, I don’t know, I think so many things come into play and you don’t always know what the big picture feels like. We did know, for instance, that in season six we wanted to explore that post-collegiate, toxic taste of adulthood where you kind of try all of the bad stuff to see if that’s you. I mean the darkness and the nastiness was definitely a reflection of our own fatigue and we didn’t feel the need to be quite as fanciful. We’d done that. 

P: The thing I noticed about season six was… The stories were dark, but the visual tone of the series was lighter than it had been previously. Was that a conscious thing to balance it out? 

MN: That’s interesting. I’ve never really noticed that and to be honest I haven’t gone back and looked at stuff very much at all. I just saw an episode for the first time in years and I’ve never watched the seasons they way other people did. I’ve never sat down with the box sets and just watched them. From the first thirteen, I only saw them in terms of production and then watched them on television maybe once. And then, as the years progressed, I may not have seen them on TV – never seen the color timed version. But we were certainly aware that that season was very, very dark. And Joss and I often didn’t go to color timing so the person in charge of post may have been like “kick it up.” 

P: Do you find it hard to watch things you’ve made then and to be able to enjoy them the way you do other shows? 

MN: It’s nearly impossible. Although I watched the musical – in fact Joss and I watched it together – and it was far enough away that I just watched it and had a great time. I think maybe I’m getting close to the point I can watch Buffy and enjoy it. But I’ve never watched Point Pleasant, I’ve never watched… I just don’t. 

P: I’d never really thought about it before. That’s interesting. 

MN: Yeah, it either turns into an exercise of longing or self incrimination. 

P: I imagine if you were really a perfectionist and kept spotting mistakes it would drive you mad. 

MN: Yeah, and until recently I hadn’t really had a good working situation. I mean Point Pleasant was a nightmare in terms of network experience and the production and I’d just had a baby, so it kinda feels like this weird dream. My nanny would go with me everywhere and we drove to the location in San Diego in this limousine and I went to a meeting with the network and they had made me cry and I got into the limousine weeping and they took me to a really fancy hotel where I had another meeting and they made me cry. And my nanny said, “What kind of job is this?” They cart you around in the most fancy limousine and you have every luxury and all they do is make you cry. So that’s what I remember when I think of Point Pleasant: that’s the day I thought I was gonna be fired. 

P: Do you find the satisfaction of running a show outweighs the stress of it? 

MN: That is a good question. I think if you talk to any Buffy related person, that was a unique experience. What I don’t enjoy is the first year thing. It feels like a gauntlet that has to be run. I’d like for a show to make it passed that so I could just do my job. 

P: And you’ve been a consulting producer on Angel and Prison Break. What did that involve? 

MN: That is usually just related to story and script stuff, just spending time with the writers and talking about their ideas. It’s a relatively one-tier job. You pop in, you stay for a while and then you leave. It’s a lovely job. 

P: So, back to Buffy, they had very distinctive speech patterns and rhythms. Did you find that made it easier to write for the characters and conform to that style of dialogue? 

MN: The great thing about that job is those rhythms were present in my work anyway and I just fell into them and I’m a relatively good mimic, in terms of voice on the page. So it was delightful to know what you were aiming for and to feel it in your own bones when it was working. No writing is necessarily easy but it came more natural to me. 

P: What characters in Buffy would you say you had an affinity for? 

MN: I had different relationships with each of them. I loved to write Xander and Willow, in particular, and Oz. All the super misfits I was really comfortable with. Buffy herself was always interesting to write ‘cause she was in a way the least accessible character to figure out and it was an interesting challenge. But in terms of ease and relatability it was Willow and Xander. I was like, “I know these people.” 

P: Okay, now I have a bunch of really geeky questions about plot points… Maggie Walsh was supposed to be the big bad of season four, but Lindsay Crouse was unavailable – that’s one rumor I heard. Is that true? 

MN: Yes, that’s true. That is actually true. 

P: Do you know what she would have done or did you never get that far with the plans? 

MN: No, we never got that far. 

P: Another rumor is that the season five finale, when it was going to be the series finale, was going to end with everyone dying? 

MN: That is not true. 

P: Last one… season seven, there is a whole thing with Buffy’s resurrection being the cause for the First Evil’s appearance and that was never really explained…? 

MN: I know that we had a rationale. There was definitely a reason but it was never very clear. But we had one. We talked about these kinds of things endlessly. Nothing was ever, at least for us, not explained. But I’ll be damned if I remember what it was. 

P: When you’re hiring writers for your own shows, what do you look for? 

MN: You know it depends very much on the show. I think that, for me honestly the biggest thing is a “no asshole” policy and I also don’t want people who I don’t trust. Many people also believe you should always have a real freak in the room. Sometimes those people aren’t totally trustworthy but you always need someone a little whack as the tendency is to hire all the A grade students with pencils in their hands ready to go. But they may not always say that really weird and off the wall thing and you need that type. But generally you just look for someone whose voice, when you read them, makes you feel something. You read a ton of scripts and they’re very competent, they’re just not inspired in any way. Whenever someone makes me emotional or really laugh, they go in the interview pile and then it’s just about personality. 

P: And when you read through the scripts, do you prefer original pilot samples, which are becoming quite popular now, or do you prefer traditional specs on existing shows? 

MN: You know, it really doesn’t matter to me. It’s much more about voice. The one thing that I don’t like to do is read the show that I’m actually working on. For Grey’s I wouldn’t read Grey’s and for Buffy I wouldn’t read Buffy, because you’re much too close to it and you couldn’t be generous. 

P: That makes sense. So when you sit down to plan a script, how do you do that? Do you start with the theme you want to talk about in any given episode? Or do you start with where the characters are at and then derive the theme from that? 

MN: It depends on the show. We were always very conscientious about theme and emotional journey. It was less about the theme and more about the emotional journey of the characters on Buffy and we had to connect them in a way. On Grey’s theme is extremely important. But it’s a piecemeal, you figure out stories you really like and then you try and figure out the theme. Sometimes you back yourself into it by having stories that you like and then you try and find out what the theme is. Other times you start with a theme. Like, one of the doctors told that one of the things that makes them really sad is when they lose a patient. A patient just stops coming to them and they don’t know why. They call that “lost a follow-up.” We thought that would be a really interesting area emotionally for all the characters – where had they disappointed people along the way. So that would be where you start with a theme and then you try and find the medical stuff that supports it.