Marti Noxon

The bane of every TV writer's existence is the likability note.

The dream of doing what I do started with watching movies by Mr. Spielberg, like 'Close Encounters,' 'Poltergeist,' and 'E.T.' That was the beginning of my obsession.

It's funny: I've joked that 'Sharp Objects,' 'To the Bone,' and 'Dietland' are my self-harm trilogy, and each one is a different side of that triangle, with 'Dietland' really about fighting back.

It all starts with a very solid, well-executed script, where the story is very clear and everybody is rowing in the same direction. That's always good; that's a constant.

When you're allowed to tell stories with ambiguity and darkness and things that are still unresolved, that's the dream scenario as opposed to having to fit into a more procedural mode or something a little more conventional. That's not what's working on TV right now.

Eating disorders are A) not fun at parties, and B) they're not very fun in movies.

I think the science around mental illness is always evolving. There's always new kinds of thinking.

I think my biggest problem as a creative person trying to work within a business for profit was that it was very important to me that people liked me. Over the years, observing other showrunners who made work that I so admired, I realized that that had to go. This couldn't be my first priority. My first priority had to be the work.

I did, of course, do research about what the current state of affairs is in terms of the eating disorder community and who's being affected, and I was surprised to see that - something that was - way back when I was in the thick of it, it was typified as a fairly white, middle-class girl problem. And if it was, it really isn't anymore.

Test audiences are notorious for getting kind of itchy when people talk too much, and you have to trust your instincts that they don't necessarily understand that you're not digesting the movie on a scene-by-scene basis.

With everything I do, I strive for a balance of tone, where it's not just one thing.

I think we're in a time when people are much more interested in a show than where you find it.