I’ve interviewed hundreds of creative people, formally and informally, everywhere from Cannes and Austin to Sundance and Telluride, L.A. and New York. Nearly all of them are writers or tied in some way to writing — authors (Salman Rushdie, Nick Hornby, Tom Perrotta), filmmakers (Guillermo del Toro, Anne Fontaine, Martin Scorsese, John Singleton, Todd Solondz, JJ Abrams), actors (Angelina Jolie, George Clooney, Geoffrey Rush), screenwriters (Abi Morgan, Erin Cressida Wilson, Graham Moore, John Ridley), and other notable creative talents (Bono, Ralph Steadman, Patton Oswalt). Here are some favorites from recent years:
Salman Rushdie
(Telluride Film Festival Guest Director 2013)
John Ridley
(12 Years a Slave)
Charles Randolph
(The Big Short)
Jane Austen
(Pride and Prejudice and Zombies)
Erin Cressida Wilson
(Men, Women & Children)
Tom Perrotta
(The Leftovers)
David Nicholls
(Great Expectations)
Phyllis Nagy
(Carol)
Nick Hornby
(Wild)
Tom Hooper
(Les Miserables)
Ralph Steadman
(For No Good Reason)
John Logan
(Genius)
James Schamus
(Indignation)
Sebastian Junger
(Korengal)
Tom Rachman
(The Imperfectionists)
Lynsey Addario
(It’s What I Do)
Jonathan Tropper
(This Is Where I Leave You)
Hossein Amini
(The Two Faces of January)
Peter Landesman
(Kill the Messenger)
Max Frye & Dan Futterman
(Foxcatcher)
Graham Moore
(The Imitation Game)
Jason Hall
(American Sniper)
Bruce Eric Kaplan
(I Was a Child, Girls)
Jesse Andrews
(Me and Earl and the Dying Girl)
Don Winslow
(The Cartel)
Scott Neustadter & Michael H. Weber
(Paper Towns, The Fault in Our Stars)
Abi Morgan
(Suffragette)
Charles Leavitt
(In the Heart of the Sea)
Caroline Thompson
(Edward Scissorhands at 25 Years Old)
Robert Carlock
(Whiskey Tango Foxtrot)
Dave Kajganich
(A Bigger Splash)
Guy Lawson
(War Dogs)
Derek Cianfrance
(The Light Between Oceans)
Mira Nair
(Queen of Katwe)
Lee Child
(Jack Reacher: Never Go Back)
Ted Chiang
(Arrival)
Steven Knight
(Allied)