Emily in Paris’ Creator Darren Star Wasn’t Going for a Millennial Stereotype

The TV showrunner also talks about his Oura ring obsession, how his routines change from city to city and his favorite ‘White Lotus’ character

Dar­ren Star is one of TV’s great­est ro­man­tics. From “Sex and the City” to “Emily in Paris,” the show­mak­er’s sig­na­tures in­clude love tri­an­gles, lav­ish par­ties, grand ges­tures and, of course, over-the-top out­fits. While film­ing the third sea­son of his Net­flix com­edy star­ring Lily Collins, which is now stream­ing, he found plenty of op­por­tu­ni­ties to feel the magic him­self—such as shoot­ing a scene at the top of the Eif­fel Tower late at night.

“You can’t get up there un­til af­ter 1 a.m. to film,” says Mr. Star, 61. “When you write things, it’s sort of a dream of what you’d like things to be, and in this case, what we dreamed, we were able to get on the screen.”

Mr. Star, who lives in Los An­ge­les, New York and Paris, likes to be­gin each day read­ing hard copies of the news­pa­pers. And like Emily, he loves to in­dulge in a freshly baked crois­sant. Here, he shares the cafe where he starts his days in each city and why pro­cras­ti­na­tion is a key to his suc­cess. 

What time do you get up on Mon­days, and what’s the first thing you do?

I get up at 7 a.m., with or with­out my alarm. I’ve got­ten very ob­ses­sive about all my sleep apps. I wear my Apple Watch and my Oura ring, and the first thing I do when I wake-up is cross ref­er­ence how much sleep I’ve got­ten. They’re gen­er­ally pretty in sync. The Oura ring is nice be­cause if I’ve got­ten a bad night’s sleep, it’ll give me lit­tle en­cour­ag­ing slo­gans like, “You’ll be OK.” 

What do you eat for break­fast? 

I’ll do a cou­ple shots of espresso when I wake up. I love go­ing out to break­fast. In Paris, I love go­ing to Café de Flore and buy­ing the pa­pers [at] the news­stand right there. In L.A., Kings Road Café or Sycamore Kitchen. In New York, I love go­ing to Balt­hazar and sit­ting at the counter there. 

What are your writ­ing rou­tines like? Is there a place where you get your best writ­ing done? 

I’m a big pro­cras­ti­na­tor. I’ll let the stress and ten­sion of the dead­line build up un­til fi­nally I can do it lit­er­ally any­where. I can sit on the Jit­ney go­ing to the Hamp­tons and write. Some­thing clicks where I’m just all in. I can very eas­ily write in bed.

What’s a vice of yours?

A great al­mond crois­sant. 

Emily is very mil­len­nial, while “Sex and the City” is known for its por­trayal of Gen X women. How do you think the two gen­er­a­tions are dif­fer­ent? Which gen­er­a­tional stereo­types do you ac­tu­ally be­lieve? 

The re­la­tion­ship to pri­vacy and shar­ing is dif­fer­ent be­tween those two gen­er­a­tions. You can’t make too many broad gen­er­al­iza­tions be­cause a char­ac­ter like Emily is a mil­len­nial, but I don’t know if she fits the stereo­type of a mil­len­nial. She’s an am­bi­tious striver—I feel like that’s a char­ac­ter that’s present in every gen­er­a­tion. She’s some­one who wants to suc­ceed and has a big heart. 

In the show’s love tri­an­gle, are you Team Gabriel or Team Al­fie?

I’m Team Emily.

What are you read­ing and watch-ing?

I have some go-to books I love for in­spi­ra­tion, like “The War of Art.” I love read­ing his­tory and nov­els. I just fin­ished “The Lin­coln High­way” by Amor Towles and now I’m read­ing “The Splen­did and the Vile” by Erik Lar­son. I watched the last sea­sons of “The Crown” [and] “The White Lo­tus.”

Do you have a fa­vorite “White Lo­tus”char­ac­ter?

Well, Jen­nifer Coolidge. I could watch it with the sound off, and I would still be en­joy­ing watch­ing her. 

What were you most look­ing for when you tried to hire the team around you?

You have to feel like you have chem­istry with the peo­ple you’re spend­ing time with. You’ve got to feel like there’s an in­stinct for that. A sense of hu­mor. I’ve been work­ing with a lot of the same tal­ented writ­ers over the years. When you’re hav­ing fun to­gether in the room, that sen­si­bil­ity gets trans­lated into the show. Putting to­gether a writ­ing staff in a way is like putting to­gether a great din­ner party. You want dif­fer­ent voices that all work in har­mony to­gether. 

What’s a piece of ad­vice you’ve got­ten that’s guided you?

Don’t be­lieve every­thing you think. We all get into those cy­cles of neg­a­tive think­ing, and I think that was a nice piece of ad­vice.