Interviews / first-hand accounts

There’s nothing like hearing your real-life protagonist tell their story in their own words. Similarly, interviews and oral histories can add important authenticity to a screenplay. Our series of guides to working with different source material moves on to look at writing fact-based scripts which make use of interviews and first-hand accounts.

Interviews & first-hand accounts: the basics

There is plenty of overlap between interviews and first-hand accounts and other types of autobiographical material, such as memoirs. However, we’ve covered these sources separately because of the editing process, which makes them valuable to writers in a different way.

Autobiographies, memoirs, diaries, and even published collections of letters have gone through a process to select and organise the material. However, raw interviews and other personal accounts which have not gone through this process are often more revealing, with the subject less filtered.

These sources allow writers to get closer to their subjects, with interviews often revealing emotions and details which can add all kinds of authenticity to your script.

Interviews and other first-hand source material can be divided into:

  1. Existing material: someone else has created this material for their purposes and you are simply using it as part of the research process.
  2. Interviews you conduct: interviews prepared and conducted by you for the purposes of developing your story.
  3. Oral histories: projects designed to record the memories of a group of individuals who share a connection, such as geography or being part of a cultural movement.

Let’s take a quick look at the issues relating to each of these types of material.

Working with existing material

The main resource here is interviews. However, you might also find things like personal letters and diaries. The material could have been created for personal use or it might have an external purposes, like research for a biography or as background for journalistic reporting.

First-hand accounts and testimonies might also be collected for official reasons, such as for inclusion in a report or inquiry. In this case, you might find the information your need in the form of published transcripts or government documents. These sources might have been subject to editing or printed in their original form.

Whatever the source, this type of material can offer important insight. However, it might not always be readily available. Universities often hold collections of letters and unpublished diaries but accessing private documents is more challenging.

The best way to work with this type of material is to take time to go through it, firstly for a sense of tone and then for specific detail. On the second read or listen, make notes (and keep track of page numbers or timestamps).

While you might have an idea of your story arc, research might uncover something which changes its trajectory.

Conducting interviews

There’s nothing like having a face-to-face sit down with your subject or with those who have a link to the events being fictionalized.

Even when a script’s source material is a non-fiction book, biography or autobiography, the writers or filmmakers may supplement this by talking with those involved. Examples where this has led to a richer film are American Sniper (2014) and Walk the Line (2005).

In American Sniper, writer Jason Hall went beyond the “bravado” on show in the autobiography of sniper Chris Kyle to portray a more layered and vulnerable side of the protagonist.

Meanwhile, the biopic Walk the Line is based on two Johnny Cash autobiographies, yet it was only by talking with his wife, June Carter Cash, did the filmmakers discover a key detail which became a pivotal part of the plot.

The advantage of this type of research is that you can skew the conversation towards your needs. Rather than picking up random pieces of information, you can ask a pointed list of questions designed to inform your story.

Some tips for conducting good interviews include:

  • Cast a wide net when looking for subjects – there may by biographers or historians with a useful perspective
  • Be upfront about what you’re doing
  • Take time to plan questions but be prepared for the interview to meander into other areas
  • Always tell the subject they are being recorded and transcribe the interview as soon as possible
  • Leave the lines of communication open for follow-up questions

Oral histories

Oral history projects capture the experiences of a certain group of people, such as those who fought in the Vietnam War or who lived through WWII. They aim to gather as many first-hand recollections as possible while the participants are still living.

This type of material can offer inspiration to craft a fictional character. It also allows you to incorporate telling details which a historian or author might overlook. Hearing people speak about their day-to-day experiences can put you into their world and – in turn – help you to take readers of your script there.

Oral histories might be available as audio, video, and/or transcripts – they are usually unedited and involve standard questions posed to the subject.

If you’re researching a project, take some time to find out if any relevant oral history projects have been done. Colleges and universities are good sources, as is YouTube. A couple of places to start are:

We’ve got more in our article on journalistic research, part of our screenplay research series.

Challenges of using interviews as source material

One of the main things to think about are the ethics of using interview-based material and unpublished personal material.

Journalists draw a distinction between “on the record” and “off the record” for a reason. Even if you’re not conducting the interview yourself, it’s important to remember that some things were meant to be kept private, which raises the question of whether you have the right to breach that privacy.

Creatively speaking, interviews can pose the problem of the single point-of-view. As such, this type of material is best used in conjunction with other sources, so you can get a wider perspective and put comments into context.

Using this type of material also means being discerning, listening or reading for the underlying emotions and things which are not being said.

As we’ve covered elsewhere, in our guide to subtext, it is often what’s not said (or even how something is said) which becomes the most revealing and interesting part of an interview.

Legal issues

If you’re working with unpublished material, including interviews you conduct yourself, the main thing you’ll likely need is a Life Rights Agreement. These are simple contracts giving you the right to tell that person’s story in the form of a script which you intend to commercialize (try to sell).

Of course, if the interview has been published in some form (such as a memoir or biography), copyright might be attached.

As always, do some research into how the source material was created and who – if anyone – owns the output. If your script gets industry attention, sooner or later, you’re likely to be asked about your sources.

Examples…

We end with a few fact-based films which were – to some degree – based on interviews with those involved in the events being fictionalized (script sources where available).

Judy (2019): While based on a play, this account of Judy Garland’s 1968 London shows relies on tapes of the troubled entertainer, which were recorded to help her biographer put together a long-delayed book on her life.

Frost/Nixon (2008): Another film whose primary source is a play, the drama is built around a series of news interviews conducted in 1977 between British talk show host David Frost and former US president Richard Nixon. Script source: Daily Script

Dallas Buyers Club (2013): This acclaimed biopic largely relies on the first-hand accounts of protagonist Ron Woodroof, whose AIDS diagnosis prompted him to smuggle approved drugs into the US for himself and others diagnosed with the disease. Script source: Script Slug

127 Hours (2010): As well as a published memoir, the makers of this excruciating drama had access to a private video diary recorded by Aron Ralston, who got trapped in a canyon and was forced to take drastic measures to survive. Script source: The Internet Movie Script Database

When They See Us (2019): This TV miniseries relied on interviews the show’s creator Ava DuVernay conducted with five men who were wrongly convicted and jailed over the murder of a jogger in Central Park.