Kath Lingenfelter has been writing for House, M.D. since last season. She wrote “You Must Remember This,” and then with long-time House scribe Peter Blake wrote the controversial season seven finale. Active on Twitter, she is known to be accessible to fans. I interviewed her twice last season, and earlier this week, we chatted by phone the other day in advance of her next episode, the mid-season premiere “Better Half,” which premieres Monday night at 8:00 p.m. ET on FOX. 
We discussed everything from goings on in the writers’ room on House to what to expect for each of the characters over the next few months—as well as the long hiatus and the fate of the series. She also revealed (in what I believe is a Blogcritics scoop) that an upcoming episode will be directed by actor/director Peter Weller (yes, he of Robocop fame). All of these topics are on for Monday night’s post-episode LiveChat Event, which follows the East Coast airing of House, M.D.
Spoilerphobes beware. There are some mild spoilers ahead for “Better Half” and other upcoming episodes, so consider yourselves warned!
“Better Half” tackles the subject of early onset Alzheimer’s and its effect on a marriage. Lingenfelter explained that she “had had an idea,” for another episode on memory. You might recall that her first House episode “You Must Remember This” also explored the nature of memory, and centered around a woman who remembered everything. Lingenfelter explained that she’s always had a “deep fascination with the human brain,” so it made some sense to go back to that subject, this time dealing with memory loss—Alzheimer’s disease.
To prepare for the episode, Lingenfelter researched what “it’s like for the family when a loved one has Alzheimer’s—specifically, early onset Alzheimer’s.” Noting that the youngest reported case of early onset Alzheimer’s was a 17-year-old patient, she explained that while the disease mainly affects people in their 50s and 60s, it can happen much younger, even those in their 30s.
Although “Better Half’s” patient of the week is a man with early onset Alzheimer’s, “the story more or less is about his wife and what it’s like for her. Is it fair for her to give up her dreams of having a family, of having children? You know,” she added, the wife is “still very young. So, does she deserve to have a ‘normal’ life?” Should she put her husband in a facility and move on?
.jpg?t=20130517094513)
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Djesus
Thanks Barbara but nothing new.
I hope we'll see House's bio dad after his mother. This is THE storyline of the season.
2 - buborek
Thank you Barbara. This interview is very interesting. I really like this season and can't wait for the next episodes.
3 - Belle
Honestly Barbara all this interview did was depress me. I have never been a fan of the "Green Card" Wife story and considered its introduction as one of the true creative low points of season 7 so hearing that Dominica returns and is a continuing presence in House's life is very dismaying news for me. Why they have chosen to bring her back on the show instead of writing her off with a simple statment from House of "oh yes we got divorced/had the marriage annulled etc" I will never understand.
I also found the comments regarding Lisa Edelsteins return to be luke warm at best. "
“The door isn’t completely closed on that, but there are just so many things that have to fall into place for that to be considered.” - this statement seems to indicate to me that this is just never going to happen. Considering that KL indicated that they are working on the last 5 episodes now you would think that they would have thought about a possible return for the much missed character of Cuddy but her words here seem to indicate that it really isn't being considered as an option and that saddens me. I miss the character of Cuddy and am sad that we will never see House and Cuddy come to any sort of resolution following the awful events portrayed in the season 7 finale.
All this interview has done has made me feel more out of the touch with the show. The things I used to like about it seem to be gone and the directions and story chices they are making this season are just unappealing. I may tune in for the Billy Cononlly episode but the rest of it (particularly the Dominca aspect) holds little appeal. After 7 and a bit years of faithful, enraptured viewing I have come to the realisation that my time watching House is perhaps over and writing that makes me so sad I could cry.
4 - Eloise
Brilliant interview! Kath is such a lovely person and the little tidbits she let us have made me feel very excited for the rest of this season. I really hope that they will continue to season 9, but if not will enjoy the rest of 8, I'm sure of that!
5 - Djesus
@Belle : they're writing now the season finale, a possible lisa's edelstein return is just to tease fans, of course she won't come back.
6 - Camila
I'm a Huddy,but i can take she not being here.What i and a lot of fans can't take is Dominika.It seems that the show writters got a blank while writting season eight! They are bringing more and more people back,and we want the story to move on,not go backwards. But if this is the last season,you guta gotta bring Cuddy back for the season finale.
7 - Sacha
I'm particularly interested in the development of Chase and the screen time amount of Jesse Spencer, so thank you very much for the insightful interview Barbara (and Kath Lingenfelter). It seems like there really is something up in the air for Chase and if it is strongly connected to House, then even better. I always loved their weird father/son-relationship and how they reflect on each other (the mutual punch in the jaw, the mutual hug, the epiphanies, the hidden vulnerability).
They kept neglecting Chase for so long now while promoting other, less interesting characters and storylines, so it's good to have him back into focus a bit. Actually, it would have been super if they came up with the whole running away thing a little earlier. Fans were waiting for something like this to happen since mid-season 6. I hope it won't be too painful to watch, as Jesse always breaks my heart with his dramatic acting skills. I'm really looking forward to the next episodes, and I'm just happy there will be more focus on House, Chase, and Wilson.
8 - lobentti
Thanks, Barbara, for warning us ...but as we already knew, it´s a D.S. story, and it´s what it is. :/
9 - Christine
I still can't believe that Billy Connolly is going to guest star on House. He's a living legend! Added with the House/Wilson and Chase spoilers, it seems like the second half of the season is going to be even more awesome than the first half!
10 - Sacha
Re: Chase's issues. I think that there is a fine line between moving on and running away, and I'm really pleased and surprised that Kath Lingenfelter mentioned his early past (seminary days, daddy issues) and not the divorce or the Dibala incident. These things have, IMO, given as much closure as possible, and the same goes for House and Cuddy. There's no real need to bring her back when things just weren't meant to last. Camerons return was awkward. I'm not sure I want to see the same happening to Cuddy.
It's actually interesting that House and Chase share so many common ground and similar experiences. It would be rewarding if they explored that. I think that the interaction with Wilson and Chase often gave House a more sympathetic side. He lost a lot of his charm and wits during the course of S7, and I can't wait to see it back on him (hopefully!)
11 - Visitkarte
Thank you, Barbara and Kath, for this wonderful interview.
This is my theory about the bracelet. I have thought about it for months now:
My theory why he is wearing it all the time is he does to look at it every day and remember what brought him there. He also wants to look at it and stop himself from ending up back there for no reason at all. BUT he's always ready to go back if holding back goes against his main values, that's why he did what he did in "Dead&Burried;".
So, the bracelet is a visual reminder of the pain, a visual self punishment that continues and a reminder not to cross certain lines.
12 - 2 lightworker
Thanks,Barbara, for your continuing generosity in sharing interviews and your own interpretations of "House."
After Season 7's roller coaster of emotion,I have not given up watching the show but do so with a much more distanced engagement. Season 8 has been interesting in observing a very slow depiction of House's state of being and the way Hugh conveys that in such a diminished state, made clear to me by his very different persona in concerts and interviews. That makes me want to see what House's evolution brings.
However, although I think it can be seen as responsible to bring Dominika back because it was flaky to drop that plotline, I wish it were otherwise and the plotline were resolved with comments alone. House's suffering and abandonment that led to that faux marriage continues to be painful to recall.
This long delay in informing viewers about one more season is suspect to me, although I do not know why. For all the chatter about money, it feels more like PR games. I continue to think that decision resides more with Hugh Laurie and David Shore than the corporate executives, and may even be part of the House provocative approach to storytelling.
However this goes, I'll stay to the end, and hope for a resolution that leaves me with good feelings about the whole House canon.
13 - Amy
Another good solid interview. Thanks Barbara.
14 - Barbara Barnett
Thanks everyone for your comments. It's nice to get back into the swing of writing all things House, and sitting down to chat with Kath for an hour was a great way to get things going for the second half of the season.
I think Visitkarte, you're onto something with your theory. I think it's very much a reminder of what he went through and what brought him there.
Hope to see you all after the episode Monday night.
15 - Laura
I'm really enjoying this season so far and what Kath said in this interfiew makes me even more eager for the the next episodes. I don't mind Dominika at all and it will be fun to see her around House. I'm also very happy to see more focus on Wilson and Chase, these characters and their relationships with House were neglected for too long. I don't care at all about Cuddy and I don't see the point to bring her back, like Cameron her story is done.
Hopefully we'll have a season 9, anyway Im planning to enjoy this one especially if is the last one.
16 - yeny
I think that house will be renovated and is a marketing strategy that can be ultima.me like to know how you feel by the low rating this season. you think of the negative criticism towards writing by the means I would have liked a Kath Lingenfelter response
barbara their predictions. about house stays or goes next season
17 - Oversimplified
Thanks for the interview Barbara. I really do like the idea for the POTW on the episode and I'm glad KL took the time to do some serious research on Alzheimer's. Whether it's early on-set or not, who looks after the people who suffer from it is definitely a hot topic and can't be discussed enough in my opinion. Also like Sacha I'm glad that they are finally going to dig into Chase's murky and distant past. Aside from Kutner he was always my favourite duckling.
@ 3 Belle
I have to say I'm with you on a lot of things. I find the the whole storyline with Dominika grotesque and looping him in with his 'family', however loosely, is just absurd. Whether or not part of their agreement will involve sex, it has been implied and I'm just not ok with sexual/domestic slavery being used first as a weapon to hurt Cuddy in Season 7, and now as some sort of light relief this season. It's dripping with misogyny and I'm deeply uneasy about it. Please David Shore never ever compare your character to Sherlock Holmes again, otherwise Doyle will start spinning like a Catherine Wheel in his grave.
As for the situation with LE/Cuddy it just feels like one big mess, and I'm gleaning that there's a shed load of 'politics' involved there. If there never is any resolution to House and Cuddy's relationship, which is looking increasingly likely, then I have to say for me the series will always remain incomplete. She was too big a part of his life for too long for that utterly offensive crash to be any sort of satisfactory denouement to their and indeed his story if they don't have the guts to deal with what happened head on. It was too big an event in HIS, let alone her life, for it not to seem like they're ignoring this humongous elephant in the room.
I'm really not feeling too optimistic about the whole 'we feel this will be a satisfactory end to the show, if it comes to that' vibe. Fox I guess are to blame for that, but they've known since last year that there was every chance this would be their final season, so had I been in the showrunners' /EP's position I'd have been inclined to remove that decision from their hands and call it a day myself, concentrating on making the best and most conclusive final season I could in the same way that Gilligan and Cranston decided to with Breaking Bad. I'm guessing money is doing the talking here and watching the last season and this one so far I'm just not convinced they have a cohesive plan for where they're taking their protagonist that won't detract from the brilliant groundwork they laid in the past. I have to say that makes me incredibly sad. I'm well aware that this a business, but that shouldn't have to exclude artistic integrity from the equation. As much as I'd love to believe KL that everybody is still fully invested, (because she does seem genuinely lovely and respectful of fans which is a novelty these days), that enthusiasm just isn't shining through in their work in my opinion, or indeed in other interviews. Everybody lies, but especially when they're doing PR.
The bottom line is it took me three weeks to get around to watching the last ep before the hiatus, when even a few months ago not watching on the night it aired would have been unthinkable. Whether I consciously want to or not it seems like I'm backing away from the show anyway.
18 - MeMe
I'd really love to have a 9th season, if for nothing else than to have Lise Edelstein return as the strong-willed HBIC Cuddy of seasons past and provide her character with a better resolution. In fact, I'd love to see how her life (professionally and personally) has turned out away from her familiar surroundings and the people whom she knows best.
19 - MMM
I had to stop reading when i read the name of Dominika. Sorry, that character is too much for me. Actually i think i´ll skip her episode as much as i love Hugh Laurie.
20 - sara
I hope the door is open for Jennifer Morrison :)
21 - MusicnandHouse
I am very excited for what's to come, but I am very concerned about the fact that the writers are working on the final six episodes and still have no idea if this will be the end or not. Sure Kath said that the finale they have planned "could make a good series finale with some adjustments" but that does not reassure me at all. I want a series finale that was written to be a series finale, as something intentionally created to wrap up the series.
22 - Ladybelle Fiske
This interview is very interesting and rather unusually revealing. I'll be glad to see more going on with Chase. Have always thought they might even make a series with him after HOUSE ends. I'd like to see a) some internal struggles over Cameron still b) an affair or more than that with Adams, who seems a good match for him. If Park gets him, that will be funny but unlikely, I think.
He is a better person in some ways than at the start of the series. But without Cameron something will always be missing in him...
Also, how has he resolved his killing that dictator? I'm glad he did (and I'm a Quaker) but ...? He's a good Catholic boy under everything.
I am not interested at all in Domenica; just don't care either way and think it's a waste of screen time... she's all right but eh!
Would like to see a return of LE if this is the last season, but wonder if that's possible. (Though she doesn't seem to be doing much with The Good Wife. I watch it for her and for other reasons-- one reason I don't end up seeing Once Upon A Time... I have Downton Abbey also being Tivoe'd at that time.
I would VERY MUCH like to see House interact with his mother and perhaps clarify the issues around his conception. At least, discuss them with her. House got his intelligence from somewhere. Maybe he finds out it was Mom... secretly brighter and more unhappy than she let on.
Looking forward to the new episodes, and hoping for S9 so the whole arc of House's life can be completed in a truly fulfilling way. Thanks...
23 - BrokenLeg
Barbara , thank you, as always, for the interview, but really a very little news.
Some remarks:
KL manifest that this year the writers are reunited and supervised in their respective scripts to try that no one of them tell something incongruent with the full story or with the others. Doing that, IMO, they work much as a team than they did in past seasons, specially in s6 &s7, when sometimes every writer seemed to go “in their own way”, writing more for their own pleasure, or for trying to win an award, than for the quality of the show. and with that the episodes lack of certain continuity. To that I call that now there are one really responsible of “story continuity”. A bit to late for that, but better late than never, although the damage was done.
Another: As KL say, they are writing now the last five episode of this season. Someone really think that they do not know if this is or not the last season? Please, come on!! They DO know it, but they can’t say it. And worse, if I’m wrong, I fear for the quality and the worthy ending of the series ( and please, in any case, no more ka-booms, please)
About Cuddy, 17@Oversimplified has put on words exactly my thoughts. And great comparison with the unseen elephant in the room....
About LE returning the show: at this point of the writing, it’s sure she will not come back. On the contrary, if she does, it must be in an bad improvised way, if contacts are not tied yet by these days. And then, the staff is or teasing to LE or Cuddy fans, or using her to rise interest or intend the return of lost viewers. But viewers were lost from many fronts: LE-Cuddy fans, people offended by the seven season final, or that thought it was a kind of unacceptable “jumping the sharks” of a once beloved series, or people that dislike this “lighter” GH, even if medical cases are pretended more or less back (really?)
About Dominika’s return: I think all the green card wife affaire was, and is, simply misogynist and offensive (to women, immigrant people, etc..) even to a person as myself, attached to the series in a great part (HL acting apart) due its political incorrectness. Nor Dominika’s, nor the s7 finale had nothing to do with sane and critical political incorrectness. It was not necessary the return of this character. Not even in the possible funny side of trying to prove to authorities that is a real marriage ( that is a bad copy of a funny Gerard Depardieu and Andy MacDowell film)
About the bracelet: If this is the tiny detail of HL mind…To 11@Visitkarte: aside to welcome you again, I thought it was too obvious to be a debate item: in my country, in my great-grandparents days was common to tie a cotton ribbon to your wrist to make you sure you remember and important thing ( as jail must be to GH, and more, as his past behaviour must be for him ).
8@lobentti: I fear I think the same!!:(
@2lightworker: I’ve missed a lot recently your posts. BTW, to the answer we both wait, still the answer is no.
And what do you think about this s8 almost “carefree” GH? Is, as Oversimplified noted in other thread of this blog an influence of HL in the creative staff? Is due to explore his comedy abilities? And about the lost gravity once the show had? And about not seeing the music in GH life again, and with that, not seeing his introspective beautiful sad side again? And about the way so quickly the Wilson-GH friendship has been recovered, although to me in a more light way, more as colleague way than real friendship?
24 - 20v
Thanks for the interview. I'm glad the team seems to agree on my take on Chase's development-- Everything is buried and he runs away and exudes an air of apathy in most of what he does. He's become colder working for House so long(he was there a whole year before the pilot episode).
I never really gave a lot of thought to Dominika as a character, but I don't think she deserves so much ire from people. It never seemed or appeared to be a romantic relationship, but everyone is chiming in with Cuddy comparisons. I think this mindset really comes from the simple fact they're man and woman, so we must pair them up and dissect them as a possible romantic couple. The same thing is happening with Chase and Adams, and it is mildly irritating.
25 - Casper
What? Dominica is back? You just lost another viewer. She was irritating enough last season and her storyline painfull to watch. I don't need more of this crap