50 Fun Facts About The L Word

On which network did The L Word air from 2004 to 2009?

It premiered on January 18, 2004 and ran six seasons; the sequel and the reality spin-off aired on the same channel.

The series is set in which Los Angeles neighbourhood?

The sequel moved the action east to Silver Lake more than a decade later.

Who is credited as the primary creator of The L Word?

She co-created it with Michele Abbott and Kathy Greenberg and later produced The Real L Word.

Where was The L Word mainly filmed?

Interiors were shot at Coast Mountain Films Studio, with location work in Los Angeles.

What was the show's original code name during development?

It is a rarely used slang term for lesbians; the phrase 'the L word' itself goes back at least to a 1981 play.

Who plays Bette Porter?

The Chicago-born actress had been famous since a 1983 dance movie.

Bette studied art history at which university?

She grew up in Philadelphia and later became a dean at the fictional California Art College.

At the start of the series Bette and Tina, together seven years, are trying to do what?

Their daughter Angelica is born between seasons two and three.

What is Shane McCutcheon's profession?

The androgynous heartbreaker is played by Katherine Moennig, a cousin of Gwyneth Paltrow.

Which character maintains The Chart, the web of who has slept with whom?

The idea came from the writers' room mapping their own friends' entanglements on a piece of paper.

In the show's original concept, where was The Chart going to appear?

The show was originally to be built around Kit; in season four Alice launches The Chart as a social network, mirrored by the real OurChart.com.

Dana Fairbanks is a closeted professional in which sport?

Erin Daniels's character dies of breast cancer in season three, one of the show's most mourned storylines.

Who plays Kit Porter, Bette's straight half-sister?

The star of Coffy, Foxy Brown and Jackie Brown; Kit takes over The Planet after Marina leaves.

The cafe where the friends gather is called what?

Its first owner, Marina Ferrer, is Jenny's first female lover; Kit buys it in season two.

Jenny Schecter arrives in Los Angeles to live with her boyfriend, whose name is what?

The others are the documentary maker who bugs her house, Kit's nanny lover, and the trans man introduced in season three.

Season two's Carmen de la Pica Morales, a DJ, becomes part of a love triangle with which two characters?

Sarah Shahi's Carmen becomes engaged to one of them, who abandons her at the altar in the season three finale.

Helena Peabody enters the show in season two as what?

She later buys a movie studio and is cut off by her mother after a sexual harassment lawsuit.

In season two, the documentary maker Mark Wayland secretly does what to his two housemates?

The documentary maker had moved in as their housemate.

Which season-three character comes out as a trans man?

He is introduced presenting as a butch, working-class woman.

Jenny's article about her friends, later filmed as Lez Girls, ran in which magazine?

By season five she has been thrown off the film's production.

Season four's Tasha Williams, Alice's love interest, is a former captain in what?

Her struggle under don't ask, don't tell ends in a dishonourable discharge in season five.

Which Oscar-winning deaf actress plays Jodi Lerner, Bette's sculptor girlfriend?

She won Best Actress for Children of a Lesser God in 1986.

The character Papi is notable on The Chart for what?

She and Angus were both written out before season five.

The sixth and final season is structured around what?

Each episode flashes back to a possible motive; the killer is never revealed on screen.

In post-finale 'interrogation tape' videos, which character did the creator say went to jail for Jenny's murder?

The seven short videos showed Bette, Alice, Tina, Nikki and Shane being questioned by police.

Which band wrote and performed the show's theme song, first heard in season two?

The trio also appear on screen repeatedly; the other two bands belong to Leisha Hailey and get referenced in the show.

Leisha Hailey, who plays Alice, is also half of which electropop duo?

She formed it with Camila Grey in 2007; earlier she was in the pop duo The Murmurs.

Bette's actress first found fame in which 1983 film?

She grew up on the South Side of Chicago and later played Angela Cassidy in Devil in a Blue Dress.

Katherine Moennig is the cousin of which Oscar-winning actress?

Her aunt is Blythe Danner; her first big role was in the WB series Young Americans.

Which actress won a 2004 Satellite Award for Best Actress in a TV Drama for playing Tina Kennard?

Ossie Davis earned a posthumous Emmy nomination the next year as Bette and Kit's father, Melvin.

The rejected 2009 prison-set spin-off pilot The Farm would have starred Leisha Hailey alongside which actresses?

It was pitched by the show's creator and shot in December 2008, years before Orange Is the New Black.

The reality spin-off The Real L Word ran from 2010 to 2012, first in Los Angeles and later where?

A 2014 documentary, L Word Mississippi: Hate the Sin, followed and won an award for outstanding documentary.

The L Word: Generation Q premiered in which year?

It ran three seasons and was cancelled in March 2023 after low viewership, then pulled from the network's platforms.

Who was the showrunner of Generation Q?

Beals, Moennig and Hailey reprised their roles alongside a new younger cast.

Which comedian and talk-show host played Carrie, Tina's fiancée, in Generation Q?

The Los Angeles Times noted Carrie was the franchise's first clearly butch character; Bette and Tina remarry at the end of season three.

Season one's 'Provocations' art-show storyline was based on a real 1990 controversy in which city?

The Contemporary Art Center there was prosecuted over a Robert Mapplethorpe exhibition.

The phrase 'the L word' as a euphemism for lesbian is traced to a 1981 play by which writer?

In My Blue Heaven a character stammers, 'You're really...? The L-word? Lord God, I never met one before.'

Jenny Schecter grew up in an Orthodox Jewish household in which Chicago suburb?

She is sent back to a clinic in her home state in season three; Mia Kirshner plays her.

In 2006 the series won which organisation's award for Outstanding Drama Series?

The same body gave it a Special Recognition Award in 2009 as it ended.

Alice is notable among the main friends for being the only self-described what?

Her longest relationships are with Dana and later Tasha.

Which actor earned a posthumous Emmy nomination for playing Melvin, father of Bette and Kit?

Davis was nominated for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series for his season-two work, recognised after his death in 2005.

Generation Q moved the friends from West Hollywood to which Los Angeles neighbourhood?

The sequel picks up more than ten years after the original series ended, with Bette, Shane and Alice joined by a new ensemble.

In Generation Q, Shane owns a gay bar named in memory of which late friend?

Shane has given up hairdressing by the sequel; Erin Daniels later returned in season three as a figment of Alice's imagination.

In season three, Helena Peabody acquires what, leading to a sexual harassment lawsuit?

The lawsuit prompts Helena's mother to cut her off financially, turning the former rival into a full member of the friend group.

Bette takes a job as a dean at which institution in season four?

Her closeted new boss there, Phyllis Kroll, is introduced the same season.

Season three's Angus Partridge, who becomes Kit's lover, works as what?

Angus is introduced alongside Max Sweeney in the third season and written out of the series in season five.

Who directed the 2014 Showtime documentary L Word Mississippi: Hate the Sin?

The film follows LGBTQ women in rural Mississippi and won the 2015 GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Documentary.

How many seasons did Generation Q run before Showtime cancelled it in 2023?

Within weeks of the cancellation the series was pulled from Showtime's platforms entirely, and a mooted New York reboot never materialised.

What real website launched alongside Alice's season-four social network version of The Chart?

Members could build profiles and read show blogs until the site was shut down after season six and redirected to Showtime.

Dana's storyline prompted an anonymous $1 million gift to a foundation researching what?

The donation went to the Dr. Susan Love Research Foundation. Ilene Chaiken later called the character's death the one plot point she regrets.