By BetteAndTinaForever

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B&TF: So, you have your show Exes & Ohs, tell me a little about it. How did you come up with the idea and where is it going? Michelle Paradise: Well, we’re in our first season and it’s based on a short film that I wrote and starred in a few years ago called The Ten Rules – A Lesbian Survival Guide. So, most of the characters come from that. It’s something I wrote in 2000. It was made in 2001 and it made the festivals and then Logo got a hold of it and we started developing it as a series for them. We have 6 episodes in our first season and it’s actually doing very well. I just found out we’re the number 4 download for MTV which is great! B&TF: How many episodes are there? MP: Six episodes in Season 1; four have aired and then once the 6 are aired we’ll be just waiting to hear about Season 2 with our fingers crossed.

B&TF: Will you be picked up by Logo for Season 2?

MP: We don’t know yet; Logo will tell us.

B&TF: I read an article which compares The L Word to your show. Can you tell me what similarities and what differences do you see given that your show is more of a comedy than a drama?

MP: Well actually I’ve been asked that question before and I don’t even know how I would compare them except that they’re both shows about lesbians. I mean really they’re two completely different shows doing two completely different things. For me, and I’ve said this before, it’s a little like trying to compare ER and Scrubs simply because they’re both shows about doctors; they do different things and they’re both completely successful at doing what they do. You wouldn’t compare ER and Scrubs and then try and say how they’re alike in this way and not alike this way. I don’t think the comparison works very well for our shows.

B&TF: Ilene Chaiken has alluded to how The L Word is “our stories” and some of the fans are disappointed because some of the stories are far fetched and they are saying that “these are not our stories”. In your show, do you try to portray stories of the Lesbian community or is it more personal to you?

MP: Well the show is very personal. Again, these shows are two shows doing two very different things. We do try and reflect real experiences of these characters and we try to be true to them and what they’re going through in their lives. No show is ever going to reflect the breadth of an entire community’s experience. We’re doing the best we can, using the characters we have to reflect lesbians in an honest way. We’ve only had six episodes to do that and, fingers crossed, hopefully we’ll have more seasons to do that and we look forward to doing more and telling more stories. I hope we’ll get that chance.

B&TF: What were you looking for when you chose the actresses for your show? I read there are 3 lesbians and 3 straight women.

MP: The only criteria was – the best actor for the job. Really, what we did do was that every person who came in knew that it was a lesbian show and that whatever their sexuality is they needed to be comfortable with kissing other women and things like that. Anyone who was not comfortable did not come in for the audition. So really it came down to the best actress and whoever was comfortable with the material; that was the criteria. The fact that we ended up with 3 of our 5 lead actors who are ‘out’ is fantastic, it’s really great and we’re happy to have that. We’re happy with our entire cast.

B&TF: Do you think if a person is openly a lesbian, it’s easier for them to portray a lesbian or do you think it’s more about acting?

MP: I don’t think it matters at all actually. It’s “finding a character” and that is always a challenge for an actor and being gay or being straight doesn’t give you a leg up at all. If you can find the heart of that character and bring that character to life it is really about acting and not who you are in your personal life.

B&TF: The characters in The L Word said that they watched some love scenes, not necessarily lesbian, to see how the scenes were done. They said if they saw fear in the eyes of some the characters, they knew it wouldn’t work. So, did you use some form of preparation for the sex scenes so that they would seem like genuine love scenes?

MP: I’m an executive producer on the project as well so when our actors have a scene that they need to do that’s intimate, we always talk to them ahead of time. Because it is two women and much of the crew is men, we make sure that we clear the set for them, we make sure that only essential people are there and working, we make the space very, very comfortable for them. The script dictates what we need from them in terms of story but then we really talk to them or, I should say, the director talks to them about how that’s actually going to play out. Our actors have been really fine with it. Our show is on Logo which is a basic cable channel so we can’t go as far as The L Word does on Showtime. Our actors have sensitive moments but they don’t have the sex scenes in the same way that other actors on other shows might. We’re always careful to talk to them, make sure they’re comfortable, make sure the set is comfortable while we’re filming and really do our best to make sure everyone feels good about what we’re doing.

B&TF: One of the actresses, Heather Matarazzo, was in the third season The L Word. Did she ever talk to you about her experiences on The L Word?

MP: No. I actually didn’t see her in that role but it’s my understanding that it was a very different character than the one she plays on the show. And she’s a consummate professional and she creates one character for one project and she’s created a different character for our project. Whether or not they bled into one another, you’d have to ask her.