When Tony McNamara took on the challenge of adapting a 1992 novel into the Yorgos Lanthimos film, Poor Things, he found inspiration for Emma Stone’s character close to home.
“I was saying to Yorgos, ‘You know, my kids aren't nice. They’re sort of narcissistic sociopaths on some level.’ And I told him the story of being at a restaurant with my son and this screaming baby and he went, ‘Someone punch that baby.’ I told him and he started laughing and he goes, ‘That's it. We should put that in,’” McNamara says.
McNamara talks about how he and Lanthimos managed to take a book about Scottish nationalism, set in Glasgow, and turn it into their own Poor Things, or not so poor things: the film is up for 11 Oscars this weekend, including McNamara’s own nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay. Plus, the screenwriter behind the Hulu series The Great tells us why he likes splitting his time between films and television.