Before I duck back into semi-retirement from House writing, I just had to do this interview. Larry Kaplow, who left the show after three seasons — and two previous interviews with me — returns for season five. His first episode back (co-written with David Shore) airs Tuesday.

• Home to House: An Interview With Returning Writer Lawrence Kaplow
  “It was like coming into a new show. It was really hard writing the first episode back. The others had been with these characters for a year — well, a truncated year because of the strike, but 16 episodes, so they had a feeling for them. I came in almost like any new writer coming into a show. The structure of the show had changed.” Read more.

For simplicity, I did this one as a Q&A so it’s mostly the edited transcript of our talk. And, um, in my defense re: the “full of shit” comment … the man cannot take a compliment and there’s only so many times you can reassure that someone gives good interview, so that was a compliment in Kaplowese. I do not say that kind of thing to all my interview subjects (though sometimes it’s tempting for a whole other reason).