One such plot thread that’s more fleshed out in the miniseries is a lengthy backstory for Witherspoon’s Elena Richardson. All parties, including Tigelaar, came into the project with both deep understanding of her characters and a plan to delve deeper into the layers left undiscussed.

“You don’t want to hear a beat-for-beat remake you want to hear the new artist’s take on the material.” Kerry Washington and Reese Witherspoon in “Little Fires Everywhere” Erin Simkin / HuluĮveryone made it really easy for her, she said, to believe the book was in the right hands. “I wanted to make sure the project was going to be true to the heart of the book, but also wanting to give it enough space to become its own thing,” Ng said, before comparing it to a cover song. Ng said she was more than aware of the changes a novel must undergo when it’s picked up for adaptation. This balance feels unique, especially when a show is changing and adding new plot points, as the “Little Fires Everywhere” series does. “It’s been the highlight of my career,” Tigelaar said “I keep joking, ‘I guess I’m done!'”

The two build on each other’s points and are equally effusive in their praise of the series and the source material. The close bond between Tigelaar and Ng is evident from their conversation. By being able to see Witherspoon and Washington square off, Ng said the audience can then see the “power see-saw” the two shift back and forth throughout the show’s eight episodes. “We’re telling the story now through the lens of a black woman, her parents are immigrants,” Tigelaar says. It’s a facet Tigelaar and the rest of the writers were excited to dive into. “I was writing about these issues of power - power coming from different kinds of privilege race and class,” Ng said.įor the author, the limited series is able to put those topics front and center in a way different than she had been able to articulate on the page. Still, she knew she always wanted to look at the nature of privilege. The original novel doesn’t cite Mia’s race specifically and, as Ng will tell you, she wrote Mia as a working-class white woman.

The series utilizes this principle with its story of the wealthy journalist and housewife Elena Richardson (Witherspoon) and the nomadic artist Mia (Washington). When you’re dealing with a story that packs in candid discussions about race, gender, class, and society, balance becomes essential, and it can be difficult to touch on all those elements without overloading two powerhouse actresses like Reese Witherspoon and Kerry Washington. Emmy Predictions 2020: Best Limited Series

Author of little fires everywhere