Below is a list of interview questions I will ask John Green if the opportunity happens to present itself upon the world premiere of TFIOS in play form at Brebeuf Jesuit Preparatory School. Will this interview happen? Almost definitely not. But if it does? Boy, will I be prepared.
First, the more serious questions:
Both TFIOS and TATWD take place in the greater Indianapolis area. Is there something beyond your living in Indianapolis that inspired those choices of setting?
I know you’re approaching the end of a year-long hiatus from social media. What is one important lesson you’ve taken away from said hiatus? Are you dreading and/or looking forward to its end?
You’ve now seen TFIOS, a story of your own creation, in both movie and play form. What differences do you see in the way the story unfolds in two mediums? And what differences do you notice between those two performance-based adaptations and your original work?
What are you reading right now?
What authors do you look up to?
What advice do you have for young writers or young creators, more generally?
When you begin writing books like TFIOS, how do you start that process? Do you begin with the characters and build the story around them, or do you begin with an idea of the story’s trajectory and create characters later?
Did you cry during the writing process?
What is your life philosophy for writing? Do you tend to stick to a daily schedule, or do you write more sporadically as inspiration comes?
How do you come up with the names of your characters like Hazel and Augustus?
What does your revision process look like once you’ve written the initial drafts of a book?
And now, the slightly silly lightning round questions:
What is your mundane superpower, i.e., peeling clementines all in one piece, selecting the perfect-sized Tupperware for leftovers, etc.
Build your perfect sandwich.
If you were to invent a new physical signal or gesture similar to the high-five, the handshake, the hug, the peace sign, the Shakespearean biting of the thumbs, etc., what would that sign be, and what would it mean?
What is something you hate that everyone else seems to like? Something you like that everyone else seems to hate?