'One of Britain's most celebrated contemporary novelists' Sunday Times In this probing series of exclusive interviews, Alistair Owen talks to William Boyd about his works and the life which has inspired them. The conversations which emerge are a deep-dive into film, art, theatre, literature and the life of a writer. This is one of Britain's most beloved authors on what it is to write in a variety of forms. 'William Boyd has probably written more classic books than any of his contemporaries' Daily Telegraph 'Arguably one of Britain's finest living writers' Sunday Express

'A lot of my plays begin as comedies and mutate in the course of the evening, because my instinct is that you have to welcome the audience in and make sure they're sitting comfortably before you can give them an adequate punch on the jaw.' Since the acclaimed London premiere of his first play in 1966, Christopher Hampton has established himself as one of Britain's most prominent, and least predictable, dramatists. From his best-known play, Les Liaisons Dangereuses, and its Oscar-winning film version, Dangerous Liaisons, to personal and critical favourites like Total Eclipse and Tales from Hollywood; from his films as writer-director (Carrington, Imagining Argentina) to his work as screenwriter-for-hire (Mary Reilly, The Quiet American); from translations (Art) to musicals (Sunset Boulevard), Hampton eloquently - and entertainingly - explores his varied career with interviewer Alistair Owen, and discusses its recurring theme: the clash of liberal and radical thought, exemplified by his most recent play, The Talking Cure, about the fathers of psychoanalysis, Jung and Freud.

'If you decide to adapt a classic or much-loved book, your working maxim should be, 'How will it work best as a film?' However faithful it is to the original, if it's not interesting onscreen then you've failed.' - William Boyd in Story and Character: Interviews with British Screenwriters Hollywood. Netflix. Amazon. BBC. Producers and audiences are hungrier than ever for stories, and a lot of those stories begin life as a book - but how exactly do you transfer a story from the page to the screen? Do adaptations use the same creative gears as original screenplays? Does a true story give a project more weight than a fictional one? Is it helpful to have the original author's input on the script? And how much pressure is the screenwriter under, knowing they won't be able to please everyone with the finished product? Alistair Owen puts all these questions and many more to some of the top names in screenwriting, including Hossein Amini (Drive), Jeremy Brock (The Last King of Scotland), Moira Buffini (Jane Eyre), Lucinda Coxon (The Danish Girl), Andrew Davies (War & Peace), Christopher Hampton (Atonement), David Hare (The Hours), Olivia Hetreed (Girl with a Pearl Earring), Nick Hornby (An Education), Deborah Moggach (Pride & Prejudice), David Nicholls (Patrick Melrose) and Sarah Phelps (And Then There Were None). Exploring fiction and nonfiction projects, contemporary and classic books, films and TV series, The Art of Screen Adaptation reveals the challenges and pleasures of reimagining stories for cinema and television, and provides a frank and fascinating masterclass with the writers who have done it - and have the awards and acclaim to show for it.