Tell Me Lies: How Showrunner Meaghan Oppenheimer Creates Those Amazing Needle Drops [Exclusive]

Something I particularly love about the Hulu original series "Tell Me Lies" — based on a novel by Carola Lovering and adapted for the small screen by Meaghan Oppenheimer — is its use of music. The show , which charts the ups and downs of the egregiously toxic relationship between Grace van Patten's wide-eyed Lucy Albright and Jackson White's charming but deeply sinister Stephen DeMarco, is told across two timelines. In one, Lucy, Stephen, and their friends attend the fictional, picturesque Baird College in 2009; in the other, the whole gang assembles in 2015 for Bree (Cat Missal) and Evan's (Branden Cook) upscale wedding.

When I spoke to Oppenheimer about the third season of "Tell Me Lies" exclusively for /Film, I specifically hoped to ask her about the show's outstanding soundtrack — because not only is it great, but it's era-appropriate. (At the risk of aging myself, I was in college in 2009 when songs like MGMT's "Time to Pretend" and "Steady As She Goes" by the Raconteurs were in heavy rotation, and season 3 includes a few more songs that, without spoiling anything, sent me back in time to my own college experience.)

As it turns out, Oppenheimer is closely involved in the show's musical stylings. "I create a playlist of the music before I start the writer's room. I do several weeks of prep before I start the room, and while I'm doing that prep, I create a playlist," she told me. "And I was in college at this time, so I'm honestly just using a lot of my favorites. All the things that I fell in love to for the first time and had my heartbreak, those are all the songs I'm using."

As Meaghan Oppenheimer told us about the music selection on "Tell Me Lies," the process is pretty collaborative, especially when it comes to crafting scenes that involve these super-specific needle drops. She said:

"It's pretty easy in that sense. I come up with that playlist. I share it with everyone. I share it with the writers, the directors, the cast, the editors, the crew, any of the crew who want it. And there's certain songs that I know specifically from scripts that I want. Sometimes I construct a whole scene of my brain because of a song."

Still, Oppenheimer admitted that there's sometimes some uncertainty, which is where all of that collaboration really comes into play. "A lot of times I'll know the song that I want in a certain scene, but not always. Sometimes I'll just say, I don't know what song, but look at the playlist, and then my editors or my directors will surprise me with something from the playlist. Or sometimes we'll present something totally new, which I am not expecting." 

That's when Oppenheimer gave a well-deserved shout-out to Maggie Phillips, who's been working as the show's music supervisor since its second season. "Our music supervisor, Maggie, who's brilliant, she works magic to make sure that we get all the music that we want because it's hard," Oppenheimer admitted. "It's a lot of... I mean, I don't know how she does what she does with making all of that work, but she managed to get us pretty much everything we wanted." 

So what about songs that Maggie Phillips can't get for Meaghan Oppenheimer to use on "Tell Me Lies?" Well, it all works out in the end. "And then if there is, for some reason, a song that we can't get the rights to, it's too expensive, she'll find alts that she'll send to me," Oppenheimer told me during our discussion. As she put it, sometimes these necessary changes create a better outcome: "And sometimes those alts will be better than what I had first imagined."

Ultimately, Oppenheimer said the songs included in "Tell Me Lies" really come from the heart — hers, to be precise, because she tends to structure scenes and moments around music that inspires her. "So it's really fun, but the music is very personal to me. I can't really write without music," she revealed. "Not while I'm literally writing, but knowing what the sound is going to be while I'm writing something is important to me." 

This is evident in the choices. Throughout season 3 of "Tell Me Lies," songs like "Soma" and "You Only Live Once" by The Strokes, "New Slang" by The Shins, "Feel Good Inc." by Gorillaz, and "Starstruck" by Santigold have graced the soundtrack of this steamy, heightened series. If you — like Oppenheimer and I both do — are particularly fond of the songs that soundtracked 2009, there's probably more stone-cold bangers on the way.

"Tell Me Lies" airs new episodes on Tuesdays, exclusively on Hulu.