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Gillian Flynnlikes her female protagonists psychotic and her endings twisted.
This isnt Flynns first time bringing one of her novels to the screen, of course.
The first thing I want to ask you about isthose teeth in the dollhouse floor.
Its such a disturbing feature of the book.
What was your reaction when you saw it come to life?It was just gut-wrenching.
Everything has been so perfect in how its been visualized.
Jean-Marc was always carrying around the book with sticky notes in it, so it shouldnt surprise me.
For me, obviously knowing how it was going to end, I felt my stomach clench, too.
Theres something about reading and writing something thats very different from actually seeing it as an audience member.
And I felt unsettled, queasy, frightened.
I was the audience member going,Dont look in the dollhouse!
Dont look in the dollhouse!and also at the same time,Look in the dollhouse!
Look in the dollhouse!
You once said that in the first draft, the actual killer was the cheerleader.
Its such an iconic ending for those have read it, changing it would be mystifying.
We never discussed ever changing it.
Camille is rescued by Curry and Richard in a way that she isnt in the novel.
To me, she had been strong enough in going back into the mouth of the demon.
She had swallowed the poison that was what she wanted to do.
The whole point was that she had made herself sick enough to the point of death.
And we wanted that suspense.
I liked that idea that she had sickened herself to that point of almost no return.
Well, since youre a former journalist …[Laughs.]
To me, it was sanity inserting itself into Wind Gap.
Was that the reason that was changed?
So that Curry would be closer?
I dont think we played with that too much, ultimately, but we still really liked that idea.
Youve talked a bit about using your fiction to write about women unleashing their anger.
Im thinking of Ottessa Moshfegh and Megan Abbott.
Do you have an idea about where you think fiction should go next?
That was my push, that women do have their dark side, and that should be allowable.
Lets allow women their full range of emotions, good and bad.
Lets allow women their full range of good and bad qualities.
Theres always room to see more kinds of women.
I have to ask, what are the odds of a season two?
This was the story that we wanted to tell.
Im really happy where we are right now.
I saw that one of the nurses names on the whiteboard behind Richard is M. Abbott?
Is that a little note to Megan Abbott?[Laughs.]
If I could have done it I would have.
Thats so funny, I adore Megan Abbott!
I dont know who wrote that up there!
Adora is this totally fascinating woman.
You pity her because theres something wrong with her, but at the same time shes such a monster.
We like certain bits of ambiguity.
And I think some people will have real pity for her.
Its her version of care in the sickest and weirdest way.
Ill let you and other readers imagine what her mothers home was like and what made her that way.
But you know, Munchausen by proxy is a very specific, very, very strange mental illness.
I want to be very clear on that part!
And Im fascinated by what people will think of Alan and his level of involvement.
Alan in the show is much more complicit than the Alan of the book.Yes, and I love that.
He knows whats going on.
We wrote this pre-#MeToo.
In the novel we get her explanations, but we certainly never get to see the murders.
Why did you include that?
We didnt know where they were going to land, or at least I didnt write it that way.
I like it that way.
I like that [they play] just when youre recovering your breath and going,Wait, what?
We tried so many versions.
There are so many different ways to do that ending.
We had many more scenes of the trial.
I really, really wanted to see Amma in her little child sociopath jail yard.
But ultimately, after you had already stayed around for the epilogue, it just felt likeanotherepilogue.
The feel feltvery different from how it does in the book.
It just felt like too much.
And we like it because nobody really knows why sociopaths do anything.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
