The Power of Story with Brian Selznick

In the Den this week is the incredible Brian Selznick—yep, the genius behind The Invention of Hugo Cabret, which became the beloved movie Hugo, directed by Martin Scorsese. He also wrote Wonderstruck, The Marvels, and so many other beautiful, genre-blending books that mix stunning illustrations with powerful storytelling. Brian isn’t just a wildly talented author and artist—he’s also part of the LGBTQ+ community, and he brings that perspective into his work in such thoughtful and creative ways. His stories often center around characters who are finding their place in the world, discovering who they are, and learning how to be fully themselves—all themes that really resonate with our mission here at Mama Dragons.

Special Guest: Brian Selznick

Brian Selznick is an award-winning author and illustrator, whose groundbreaking books have sold millions of copies and been translated into over 35 languages. He revolutionized storytelling with The Invention of Hugo Cabret, a #1 New York Times bestseller, which won the Caldecott Medal and was adapted into Martin Scorsese’s Oscar-winning film Hugo. His bestsellers Wonderstruck and The Marvels further cemented his reputation as one of publishing’s most imaginative storytellers. Selznick also illustrated the 20th anniversary covers of the Harry Potter series and collaborated with Steven Spielberg and Chris Meledandri on Big Tree. He lives in Brooklyn and La Jolla with his husband, Dr. David Serlin.

Links from the Show:

• Brian’s website: https://brianselznick.com/ 
• Find Brian’s book here: https://bookshop.org/beta-search?keywords=brian+selznick 
• Join Mama Dragons here: www.mamadragons.org

In the Den is made possible by generous donors like you. Help us continue to deliver quality content by becoming a donor today at www.mamadragons.org.  

Transcript

SARA: Hi everyone. Welcome to In the Den with Mama Dragons. A podcast and community to support, educate, and empower parents on the journey of raising happy and healthy LGBTQ+ humans. I’m your host, Sara Lawall. I’m a Mama Dragon myself and an advocate for our queer community. And I’m so glad to be part of this wild and wonderful parenting journey with all of you. Thanks for joining us. We’re so glad you’re here. 

Our guest today is the incredible Brian Selznick, the genius behind The Invention of Hugo  Cabret, which became the beloved movie Hugo directed by Martin Scorsese. Brian also wrote Wonderstruck, The Marvels, and so many other beautiful, genre-bending books that mix stunning illustrations and powerful storytelling. And Brian isn't just a wildly talented author and artist, he is also part of the LGBTQ+ community. And he brings that perspective into his work in thoughtful and creative ways. His stories often center around characters who are finding their place in the world, discovering who they are, and learning how to be themselves, all themes that resonate with our mission here at Mama Dragons. So we're so excited to have this conversation with Brian today about his books, his creative process, and what it means to tell stories, particularly those that help queer kids – and all kids, really – feel seen and celebrated. Brian, welcome to In the Den. It's so great to have you with us.

BRIAN: Thank you so much, very happy to be here with you today.

SARA: Me too! I have so enjoyed learning more about you and reading about all of the work that you have done, you have authored over 35 books, illustrated many more, most of them best sellers. You illustrated the 20th anniversary covers of the Harry Potter series, you've collaborated with Steven Spielberg and Chris Meledandri on Big Tree… your breadth and depth of your work is incredible, and so I'd love to just hear a little bit about your story and your journey to becoming an author, and one who blends such imaginative, cinematic, artistic construction into your work. How did you come to that format that's so very unique to you? What draws you to telling stories in that way?

BRIAN: Oh, wow, well, thank you so much. Really, I think it just comes down to the fact that I liked to draw and tell stories when I was a kid.  And I was very… I was very encouraged to be an artist when I was young. My dad was an accountant, and my mom was a housewife, but they were very clear that they wanted all their kids to do whatever they wanted to do. So I took art lessons, and I had a very good public school education in East Brunswick, New Jersey, where there was very good art classes. And everyone, when I was in high school, told me I should get into children's books, because that was, I think, the main thing they could think of as a job for someone who could draw. So it made me really, really not want to be a children's book illustrator when I got to college. And I went to the Rhode Island School of Design because I could draw, and I didn't know what I was going do professionally, except I knew that it was not going to have anything to do with children's books. So I avoided any class with children's books, or children's book teachers. I didn't take any classes with Chris Van Allsburg or David Macaulay, who taught at the school. I didn't go hear Maurice Sendak when he came to speak. And I got into the theater. I was acting, I was eventually designing sets, I decided that's what I was going to do professionally. But when I got out of college, I guess I rethought everything for various reasons, and found myself realizing that, in fact, everyone who I spoke to in high school was right. And I really should be writing and illustrating children's books. It's the perfect way for me to incorporate everything that I love, the storytelling that I love, the drawings that I love, as well as the theater that I love, too. Because picture books or storytelling in a book has a lot of very interesting natural parallels with stories on stage. That eventually grew to incorporate film as well, in terms of how I was thinking about storytelling. But I didn't know anything about children's books after I graduated, since I had avoided it so studiously. And, yeah, I got a job at a children's bookstore, Eeyore's Books for Children, that's really where I learned all about children's books. My first book was published there. I was still a bookseller. The book was called The Houdini Box. It came out in 1991, and I have been making books ever since. 

SARA: Wow, that is amazing. Can you tell us a little bit about your process? I'm curious, given that illustration and art are so intertwined. What comes first? Does the story idea come first? Does a drawing come first that then turns itself into a story? 

BRIAN: The story comes first, but the story doesn't come quickly or easily. And I never, ever draw first. So, I think I see most things in my head pretty clearly, and I see that. And that's what comes to me first. I see images. I see a city that I love, or I see people doing something, and that is often, like, the beginning of the seed for an idea of what will become a book. Something will just kind of plant itself and stick. And then I'll want to know what that is, or who that person is, because I generally will see something sort of like an outline of a person without knowing who the person is. And then I write, usually in third-person present tense. There is a boy. He is walking down the street. He is in a city. Or the girl is sitting in a park, things like that. And my stories generally begin as lists like that. Like, it's just lists. And then, depending on if I know how the book is going to be illustrated when I start, I will write lists of what I want the drawings to be. But usually I don't know what the drawings are going to be when I start, so I just write the narrative. And then I slowly begin to write actual prose, I suppose. I don't always write the scenes in order, because I generally don't know where the book is going and I don't know what the plot is for much of the process. And that used to make me feel very bad all of the time. I’ve been doing this long enough that I came to realize, eventually, that that's just my process, and the time is part of it. And so, eventually, when I have a more clear idea about what the story is, and who the characters are, I do begin sketching. And again, I will see if, when I'm at the part where I'm going be illustrating, I generally see what I want the pictures to be in my mind, but it's very hard for me to translate the pictures in my head to the pictures on paper. I'm not somebody who can draw from my head. I can draw stick figures, and I can draw quick sketches, but I can't draw well from my head like many people who draw are able to do. So I have to do a lot of research. I have to photograph models. I have to do a lot of background work to get ready to do the actual drawings in the book. But the first things I draw are from my head, very quick to get the gestures down, and the movement, and the composition. And then I spend, you know, I don't know, three to five years making the whole of the book, if it's a book like Hugo, Wonderstruck, or The Marvels, or Big Tree. It's generally this process, and then once I get to the final art, and I know exactly what each drawing is going be, and I've done all the research and it's time to just do the crosshatching – which is the shading, to make everything look pretty as realistic as I can – just the crosshatching can take five to eight months or more, depending on how many drawings there are. So I'm just sitting at my desk, cross-hatching for months and months. And that's when I listen to audiobooks and become extremely, extremely well-read. The rest of the process, I can't listen to anything. I don't even listen to music, usually, when I'm working, because I need to just be in my head. But as soon as I'm crosshatching – It's not that it's boring, but it's boring in a way. There's decisions that are being made constantly. But a lot of them are subconscious, or a lot of them are more like, “Okay, how do I make this character look like they're moving forward in the drawing? How do I get your eye to go there?” And I can be listening to books while I'm doing that.

SARA: That's amazing, and wild, and very interesting, and it's a great reminder of how different the creative process is for everyone. And thank you for sharing that. It's like a little insider scoop into your world. Your books often center characters who are searching for belonging or identity, something inside themselves, connection. I'm curious if your own experiences and identity as a queer person has influenced that in your writing?

BRIAN: Yes. The answer is yes. I just wasn't conscious of it for a very long time. So I grew up in the 70s and 80s, I was very closeted as a child in the suburbs. I didn't really start coming out until I was out of college, which I graduated in 1988. So it was the height of the AIDS crisis. And I was coming out into a very strange, difficult time. And I started making books. Like I said, my first book came out a couple years later, in 1991. I was pretty young when it was published. And, for a while, for many, many years, none of my characters were specifically queer. They were just lonely, and generally lonely. And I remember early on – many, many years before I made Hugo, Wonderstruck, and The Marvels – because Hugo came out after I'd been making books for 15 years, so I had a lot of books before Hugo. And a friend of mine asked me one day if I thought my books were queer, even though I had no queer characters. And again, I hadn't really even thought about it at that point. I was just making books, some of which I was writing, like The Houdini box, most of which I was illustrating for other writers. I said no. I said, “I don't think my books are queer, because my characters aren't queer.” Or at least they're kids, so, like, there's no real idea about who they're going to be when they grow up, even though my husband knew he was queer from the time he was 3, without exaggerating. It took me longer. And so everyone has their own different… journeys with that idea. But for me, I thought, “No, my books are not queer.” And he laughed in my face. And he said, “Brian, all your work, it's coming from who you are. And your books are about lonely kids who often feel trapped in a situation and long to get out. Your first book, The Houdini Box, is about a kid who wants to escape from things, and his idol is a man who's able to escape from everything, including trunks and closets. So, I think that perhaps there is a queer sensibility in your work.” And it wasn't until The Marvels – which came out in 2014, I think – where I had out, gay characters. But I realized all of the work I was doing, after I had this conversation with my friend, who himself was queer. It didn't really change my work, but it shifted how I think about my work. And after The Invention of Hugo Cabret came out which, if you had asked me what the plot was, or what the story was about, I would have said it's a book about a kid, lonely kid who lives in a train station who meets a mean old man who turns out to be a filmmaker -- And when I was on tour for the book, a woman came up to me and said, "I love that your book is about how we make our own families.” Which is, you know, it's a universal thing, but it's also a particularly queer thing.  And I hadn't consciously known that. Of course, like, I wrote the story, and I had an orphan, and I wanted him to be happy at the end, so I gave him a family. But I hadn't totally been conscious of the idea that that's what the book was about. So from that moment on, I very consciously made my books, or was aware that my books were about people who were making their own families.

SARA: That's beautiful. I so appreciate that story, but also how it's such an illustration of how we bring our own experiences and hearts into our reading.  

BRIAN: Yes. 

SARA: As well. Now that you are approaching it more consciously, when you are writing, especially when you are writing “out” characters or more conscious queer themes, what do you hope LGBTQ+ kids see or feel when they read your stories? 

BRIAN: I mean, generally, my main concern is that people just like the book and like the characters, and like the story, and get caught up in it. But, my new book, Run Away With Me, which just came out, is my first gay teen romance. So it's the first book that really centers the relationship itself, and the idea of falling in love. In the Marvels, which I just mentioned, you don't know anyone in the book is gay for about three-quarters of the whole story, then you essentially find out everybody's gay. And the uncle character tells his nephew his story about the man who he had loved, who died of AIDS. And so there's a flashback where we see the romance, but it's from the point of view of an adult telling his nephew the story. So, it's told in a certain way that the uncle is feeling is appropriate for his nephew to hear. And he, I think at that point, he has a sense that his nephew is a queer kid, but it's not been spoken about consciously. The boy does grow up to be gay. We do find that out in a coda in the story. But with Run Away With Me, I found myself wanting to see what it would be like to live inside the part of the story where the characters are falling in love.  And I didn't really fall in love until I was 30. I began coming out in college, mostly came out after college. Had, I don't know, five 3-month relationships over the course of my 20s. And then met the man who became my husband when I was 30. So, I did not have a gay teen romance or anything close to it. So it was a little bit like writing science fiction, in terms of my own personal experience. I was consciously aware that I wanted one of the boys to have some of my own attributes. So I gave one of the kids asthma, which I have, and it was much worse when I was growing up. I had a big surgery on my chest when I was a kid. So I gave the boy the surgery as well. So those were conscious things that I gave to one of the characters that were mine because I knew how to write about that, and I knew what that would mean for a character. But the other boy he falls in love with is someone who's, you know, more confident in their physical being, which was harder for me to imagine what that was like. I set the story in 1986 in Rome for various reasons. And then decided to write the story so that it wove together with three other queer love stories from history, one in the 1940s, one in 1900, and one in the 1600s.  And I wanted to look at queer history. And the other thing I was conscious of was the fact that when I was growing up in the closet, I was also unaware that there were other gay people out there. I had no idea there was any queer history, there was no internet, there was no way of getting any of this information. So, I thought I was growing up on a very lonely island. And it wasn't until I started coming out and meeting people who were telling me stories and leading me towards books that opened my eyes up to the history of the queer experience, that I realized I was part of a culture. And I was part of a history that went back to the beginning of time. And that gave me a feeling of stability, where there hadn't been one previously. So I wanted to explore that very consciously in the book. Everything else, I thought I was making up the characters' personalities, I thought I was making up a lot of – and I did make up a lot of things. But when I finished the book, I realized that essentially what I was doing was telling myself now – and I'm confident now, I feel good about myself physically, I feel good about myself health-wise, I feel good about myself as a queer man in a great relationship – telling myself then, with all the insecurities I felt, that things are going to be okay. And that's what the two boys in the story, I eventually realized came to represent, were those two different aspects of my own history. If a young queer person comes upon this book, again, first of all, I hope they like the characters, I hope they like the story. But even if it's just on a subconscious level, because most writers don't want to be specifically didactic, or feel like their readers are getting lessons. But if something comes through about the way in which history gives us strength, and the way in which vulnerability also gives us strength, right? – I was very, very afraid of being vulnerable as a young person because the world's scary. I could have been rejected in a very serious way. I could have been subject to, I don't know, perhaps to physical violence, and I think about the fact that because I could draw, a lot of the people who may have bullied me for other reasons respected me because I had a talent that they didn't have. And they were able to use me, and my talent, to their benefit. So, I painted skulls and flames on the football helmets of some of the people who may have otherwise not wanted to interact with me in a positive fashion otherwise to make a broad generalization. But I had a feeling, because I knew that some of the people who I was doing this work for in high school, were also not very nice to friends of mine, or to people who I knew. But at that time, I wanted to be safe, and safety was important, and it is important. And we do all constantly have to make decisions about what our safety is, and where we can take risks. And again, I didn't have any books like this when I was a young person. And the fact is, if I had seen this book when I was a young person, I probably would have avoided it because I wouldn't have wanted anyone to see me near it. But I hope that if someone, a young person now, does see this book. And they're in a place where they are feeling worried about things that there is a moment of bravery where they can take it in. Because it's for you to pick up and read and to find and to feel brave with, if you're ready for it. That's what I would say.

SARA:  That's beautiful, and I want to just make sure we say that we will feature links in our show notes to your books, and your books. We have a Mama Dragons bookshop, and we'll make sure that all of that is available for our listeners there. I can't wait to read this book now, it sounds like such a beautiful story, and so compelling to weave history into it and to remind ourselves – which I think is still important today, and still really hard to do – of the long history of queer identity in this world. Especially today, as that is just so trying to be shoved aside and erased and all kinds of terrible things happening. I'm curious when you talked about when you were a kid that you might have just shied away from your own book, not wanting to be seen with it. But were there books that made you feel seen, or that you really loved when you were growing up, that really inspired you?

BRIAN: So, the idea of a book that was literally about queerness would have terrified me. But it turns out, all the books I did like were either by queer authors, who I found out later were queer authors, or were books that I discovered had some very interesting, queer metaphor. And again, I discovered all of this much, much later. I was just drawn to what I was drawn to. My favorite picture book maker when I was a kid – all my favorite books were by a man named Remy Charlip, who, if your listeners don't know Remy Charlip's books, I highly recommend they pick them up. He was a queer artist, writer, theater maker, performer. He worked with Merce Cunningham and all of these really interesting artists in the 60s and 70s. And his most famous book is called Fortunately, which I just was obsessed with as a kid, where every time you turn the page, a new element in the story occurs that's either positive or negative. And if it's positive, it's full color, and very bright and happy. And if it's negative, it's black and white and sad. So as a kid, you get the sense of the pattern very quickly, so it becomes very exciting to see how the pattern affects the story as you move through the pages. And of course, later, when I was starting to make picture books, the idea of what happens when you turn the page became very important. And just sidebar, when I was starting to work on Hugo, I met Remy Charlip for the first time and was able to tell him how much I loved his work. And I realized he looks just like George Méliès, the filmmaker. So I asked Remy to pose as the character in the book, so all of the drawings of George Méliès in The Invention of Hugo Cabret are actually my favorite childhood illustrator, Remy Charlip. And then my favorite chapter book, my favorite novel that I read as a kid, was a book called The Borrowers, which was a story about a family of little people that live under the floorboards of a kid's house. And I basically thought it was a true story, and I would make furniture for the little people that lived under the floorboards of my house. And, again, many, many years later, I was talking to my friend Celeste Lescene – who was one of the founders of The Trevor Project and has a new, amazing project underway called Future Perfect.

They're an amazing, amazing person. And we were talking about books we liked, and when I said, “I love The Borrowers, I loved The Borrowers as a kid,” Celeste said, “Oh my god, that was one of my favorite books, too.” And that's when Celeste said to me, how interesting it was to him that it's such a queer book. And I was like, what's queer about it? Like, it's about a boy in this little family of, a heterosexual family of little, tiny people who live under the floorboards of this kid's house, a mother, a father, and a daughter. And Celeste said, “It's a family of people who live secretly in a world that doesn't know they exist, and that ignores them. And their big fear is being seen. Yet, from the big world, they're able to take everything they need to survive. And the story is about this one boy who can see them, and who knows about them and is seen by them.” And that really moved me, that I was very affected by that reading of the book, which I do feel I must have understood in some fashion. And again, you don't have to be a queer kid to love The Borrowers, because just the idea of having a family of people living under the floorboards of your house is appealing to most kids. But for queer kids, I think that it's interesting that that story of surviving while living secretly, has a connection.

SARA:  Wow, this is beautiful analysis of these books and stories. I want to go back to Hugo, The Invention of Hugo Cabret, for a moment, and I love that little trivia tidbit about the illustrations. What a beautiful full-circle moment. The book was such a massive success, and then it became a Martin Scorsese film. And I'm curious what it was like when you found out it was going be optioned, and then Scorsese was attached to it. 

BRIAN: It was as insane as anybody could imagine something like that would be. I had been making books for 15 years when Hugo was published. There had never been any interest from Hollywood. I never thought there would be interest from Hollywood in my work, which was fine, I just loved making books. I had friends who had had some experiences in Hollywood, most of which were terrible. But even as they told me these stories about the horrible things that happened to them in Hollywood, I would think to myself, “But it's so glamorous, right? There's money, there's names we recognize, there's stories about meetings that, even when they're terrible meetings, they're meetings! You're having meetings with people in Hollywood, like, that's so cool.” And then it started with emails. It started with emails from people in Hollywood, all different people in Hollywood who had read the book and wanted to know if the rights were available. And I did not know that early copies of one's books are often read by people in Hollywood to see if they would be good movies. Uh, that had never happened to me before.

So I guess they're, like, the first readers, I suppose. A lot of production offices have people who are hired to read these unpublished books. And perhaps because Hugo had something to do with the history of cinema itself, people in Hollywood began to take notice. So, it was actually a literary, a person in the literary office named Grey Rembert. She was the person who first emailed me. And said – a lot of the other emails were like, they were practically like, “Dear Sir and or Madam, Are the rights available to The Invention of Hugh Cabret? Thank you very much.” And Grey's letter said, “Dear Brian, I grew up in a house that had an automaton, and it terrified me, and I remember being so afraid of it. But I just read your beautiful book and I was so moved by it.” And she said all these incredible things about the story. And then she ended it by saying, “We want to take care of your orphan.” And I was like, “I don't know who this is, but the person that I want to give the book to.” And then when we eventually spoke on the phone, she mentioned some very, very, very big names in Hollywood who she wanted to share the book with. One of whom was Martin Scorsese. And it was thrilling. It was just thrilling. It didn't seem realistic. Mr. Scorsese, in fact, was invited to direct the movie. John Logan was hired to write the screenplay. Then there was a writer's strike, and Scorsese left, and John Logan left, and other people came in. And it became, I was basically living the story that all my friends had told me. And by that point, once a contract is signed, there's nothing you can do. So I thought, “Well, it's going be a terrible movie if these other people make it, but at least there'll be billboards with the name of my book on it, and maybe more people will buy the book, because it's not going to change the book. The book will always exist.” But, little miracles, big miracles sometimes happen. And for various reasons, all those other people had to leave the project. Mr. Scorsese suddenly was back. John Logan was back. And within what seemed like 5 minutes, I was on the set as it was being built in England, in an office meeting, Mr. Scorsese, having him tell me how much he loves my book, and how excited he is about telling this story in 3D. You know, the movie was originally released in 3D. And I was struck by the parallels with my own story and George Méliès and Mr. Scorsese himself, in the way in which he was excited about experimenting with new film techniques the way Méliès had been. And I later figured out my entire book is essentially about Martin Scorsese. I didn't realize that, but there's a film scholar in the book. There's a kid who’s lonely and looks out of windows, like Martin Scorsese did. I found out later, if you know Goodfellas, it opens with Henry Hill as a kid looking out a window and watching some mobsters on the street and getting a dream of being a mobster himself. And Hugo opens with a kid looking out of the clock down at the world below him. There's a character, Hugo brings a forgotten filmmaker back from obscurity to be celebrated. And I found out later Martin Scorsese brought back Michael Powell, the director of The Red Shoes from obscurity to celebration. So, eventually, I found myself backstage before a premiere of Hugo at one of the many premieres we attended, and I was able to say to him, “You know, I think I may have written this book for you.” Because it was so personal, and I think that comes through, and when I was on the set there were copies of my book everywhere. Every department, every actor, everybody had to read my book, or was shown my book. People in the special effects department, people told me that Scorsese would send them back to the drawing board if the scene didn't match the double-page spread of the drawing in my book. Actors, I have a photograph of Martin Scorsese directing from my book. He's showing the kids, Asa Butterfield and Chloe Moretz, what to do from a drawing in my book. So I, like, accidentally storyboarded a Martin Scorsese film. There are changes, you know, of course, but ultimately it's a very, very faithful adaptation in a lot of ways, and I think the fact that Martin Scorsese loves cinema the way I love books came through in this story. It was really thrilling to be a part of the whole experience. And it's still, all these years later, it's still unrolling, like the excitement, I feel like it's still going. I was just in Rome, where they had a screening of Hugo at an outdoor piazza. And they invited me to come to a half-hour conversation about the movie. I'm going to be doing another screening in Manhattan soon, talking about the film. So, it's a gift that has really, really kept on giving. 

SARA: What a gift to have the best possible Hollywood story and outcome. I mean, just listening to you talk, it brought tears to my eyes. I think, wow, what a beautiful tribute Scorsese did to this book. And that is a rare thing, I think, when beloved books are made into films. So often, there are so many friends and family that won't see the movie, or just cling to the book because it's just never as good as our own experience of reading the book. And when there are a few films out there that do it. And that is one of them. How beautiful. How fun.

BRIAN: Thank you.

SARA: A bit of a departure from books here, but I was really captivated about how you also wrote a reimagined story of The Nutcracker for Christopher Wheeldon's Joffrey Ballet. And I just wanted to hear more about that because it's such an iconic, beloved ballet. And how did that project come about, and what were the inspirations for how you reworked the story?

BRIAN: Yeah, that was another gift of Hugo. I got an email from Christopher Wheeldon, whose name I knew as a choreographer and as a dancer. I didn't know his work very well, but I knew how important he was and how famous he was, and how beautiful his dances were. I quickly saw many things that he did. An American in Paris had just opened on Broadway, and I went immediately to see it, and was just astonished by it. And he was a fan of Hugo's, and he was working on a reimagining of The Nutcracker at the Joffrey. They had been running Robert Joffrey's Nutcracker for 40 years, a very beautiful and very traditional telling of the story. And the Joffrey had approached him about reimagining it. And they had the idea to tell the story from a different point of view. They wanted to set it in Chicago. I think they had already had the idea to set it at the Chicago World's Fair which occurred in the late 1800s. And Chris thought I would be a good person to write the story. So, I had seen and knew The Nutcracker the way everybody else did. I had seen it over Christmas, we all know the music. We all feel like, even if we're not dancers, we feel like it's in our bones. We hear any of those songs, any of those pieces of music, and we immediately feel the snow coming down and it's just part of us. So, I was very intrigued by all of the above by Christopher, by the story, by the Chicago World's Fair. By coincidence, my husband and I, who have many, many collections, collect ephemera from World's Fairs. So I had guidebooks and all sorts of information from the Chicago World's Fair that I just went into our living room and read. And I learned that a lot of the Chicago World's Fair, if not most of it, was actually built by immigrants from all over the world as when they first came from wherever they were coming from to America. And Chris had said that he wanted to set the story not with rich people. He said, you know, and Chris grew up dancing in The Nutcracker at the Royal Ballet in London. He was the Nutcracker Prince as a kid. And he said it's a story about a rich girl who has everything. And then she dreams of having a lot more stuff. And then she wakes up and she has a lot more stuff. And that's essentially the plot. But we love it because of what's happening. We love it because of the music, we love it because of the spectacle. We just know the story. We probably don't love it because of the story. We love elements of the story. We love her. We love Clara, or Maria, you know, she has different, Marie, depending on, you know, which version you're seeing. She has both names. We love the mice. We love the tree. We love the dancing snowflakes, which are part of the story. So I thought, what if we set the story among the immigrants who are building the fair. And I learned that a lot of the sculptors who sculpted the famous giant sculptures around the fair were women. And I found this amazing photograph of an immigrant's shack that was on the grounds of the fair as it was being built. And I imagined a little girl and her mom, who are immigrants, who've lost their father, and they've come to America. The mother's an artist, and she's making these models for these sculptures. And the Drosselmeyer figure becomes the figure who – there was an impresario who really presided over the whole fair. And if anyone's read The Devil in the White City, they know the man who conceived of the whole fair. So he becomes the Drosselmeyer figure who visits the house and throws a Christmas party for all the immigrants who are working. And so the story takes place before the fair opens. And Marie is dreaming of, when she dreams, she's not just streaming of the fair as it is. She's dreaming of it as it may be. And she's dreaming about family. And so when she wakes up, it's about the way in which, again, a new family is formed so that there's an emotional arc to the story, that may not have been there, or at least wasn't there in this version previously. And we worked with the brilliant set designer Julian Crouch, set and costume designer. And I brought all of my research in and shared it with everybody. And it was great and I think one of the most interesting things was, I had to write an outline that couldn't have any spoken text, right? There could be no dialogue. Everything had to happen through dance, or movement, or through visuals. So, Chris likes to joke that the first treatment I gave him would have taken about 17 hours to dance, because it was so detailed. So a lot of it became, like, paring down. But it's very similar to what I think about when I'm doing the sequences of drawings in my books, where there's no text. We're following parts of the story with movement. We're watching Hugo run down the hallway. We're seeing Rose in Wonderstruck fold a paper boat and send it off onto the lake. So it's essentially like doing one long picture sequence to tell the entire story. And it opened a couple of years before the Pandemic, and it will probably be running for many decades to come. So I hope, if anyone's in the Chicago area during Christmastime that you go see it, because it came out pretty nicely. 

SARA: Oh, I would love to go to Chicago to see it during Christmastime. As you said, a child who grew up going to The Nutcracker and taking ballet classes as a kid, it is such an iconic story. And yours sounds amazing. How long did it take you to complete the project?

BRIAN: I don’t remember but it was probably a year or two from the first conversations to me beginning to write. And there were these amazing afternoons where I would go to Chris's apartment. So I said earlier, we all have the music in our bones, but he literally has the music in his bones. So he could count and move as we were talking to understand how long it would take a character to get from this part of the stage to this part of the stage during a piece of music. So he would be able to say, we can't have these three things happening, because we only have this much music. So we have to have one thing happen. Or, we have too much music, we need four more things to happen. So I got to watch him stand up and move, and begin to think about what the images might look like. And then I got to go to the Joffrey with him and watch him build the dance on the dancers, the way in which he worked with them. It was really incredible. And I got to go to opening night. And they even invited me out on stage during the curtain call to take a bow with Chris.  I have a website. And on the website, there's a whole section about the making of the ballet, where you can see photographs from the production if anybody wants to see a little bit more, and if it's difficult to get to Chicago. 

SARA: Absolutely. Well, and I'm thinking as I'm listening to you, that the musical pieces are really kind of the pillars of the outline, right? You know this piece of music comes next, and so I'm curious, as you were working with Chris, were you reimagining some of the moments of the music? I'm thinking, like, we have some iconic moments of like “This is the Sugar Plum Fairy sequence.” 

BRIAN: Yeah, yeah.

SARA: How did you have to balance the, like, iconic pieces that everybody has come to expect with reimagining a new story? 

BRIAN: I would say it's actually, for all of the changes I've just described, a very, very faithful adaptation of The Nutcracker. So every piece of music where you expect something to happen, has some version of that expectation happening. But often just with a little twist. So, we still get the Sugar Plum Fairy Dance, but there's no Sugar Plum Fairy. One of the statues that the mother has been sculpting has come to life and becomes the guide who brings you into the fair. And she, of course, is danced by the mother. And instead of having a prince figure, the Drosselmeyer figure, who's the impresario of the fair, comes in and dances with her. So he's falling in love with the statue, the mother, the Sugar Plum Fairy character. So all of the elements are there. The tree still grows, there's still the dance of the snowflakes, there's a battle. But for instance, in the second act, essentially, the two kids just watch as food from all over the world dances. And it's great, because each of those dances is great.  But the architecture of the fair is that it's a World's Fair. And there are pavilions that represent different countries. So, the children are traveling through the pavilions of the fair. And they come upon the different countries' pavilions. And inside that pavilion, they essentially see what's happening inside the pavilion. So even that's sort of tied to something that makes sense within the fair. And I think the biggest change we made in that is there's a Russian dance, but it actually sounded kind of, really interestingly, Western. And Chris turned it into an Old West dance, where the ballet dancer who has the lead in that section actually has a lasso that he's really lassoing. And it's incredible. So, the beats that you expect are actually all there. And that was very important to both of us. Because we love the story as much as we do, we're very much aware of how much the audience loves the story. We weren't trying to just change things to make them different. We very much wanted to meet the expectations that everybody had. But then find new ways into each of those moments. 

SARA: Amazing. It sounds so beautiful. You have had so many different kinds of collaborations in your career with some really incredible collaborators. Chris and Martin Scorsese and Spielberg, and I'm curious if there is anyone that you would love to collaborate on a future project with. Any seeds of ideas that are moving around in your mind? 

BRIAN: I mean, I would say that one of the things I appreciate about where I am right now, is that I've watched really extraordinary artists make things that they would not have made otherwise because of something I sat down and wrote and illustrated. Right? Like, I've had the incredible opportunity to see people be inspired by things I've made. And I have discovered, I discovered pretty quickly, that that's pretty much as satisfying, if not more satisfying, than actually making something yourself, being able to inspire other people to make something. To know that Martin Scorsese spent three, probably three years of his life, working on a story that I made up at my desk, that I was unsure anybody would ever read, but I wrote it because I fell in love with the story. And that inspired him to spend his time making something he wouldn't have made. So, I'm just very excited that as I put more books out there. And again, I have been invited to write something as a screenplay first, Big Tree, the book you mentioned earlier that I've worked on with Steven Spielberg actually began as a screenplay that Mr. Spielberg and Mr. Meledandri asked me to write. And then the pandemic hit, and it seemed clear the movie wasn't going to happen. So I suggested we turn it into a book. So that was an unusual experience where I adapted an unproduced screenplay into a book with pictures. And I just like the idea that I get to spend my time making more books and sending them out into the world. And again, like, I've met people who I then collaborate with, sometimes. Like with Chris, the book brings the person to me. So I'm just excited to see who reads the book, who wants to work on something, but ultimately, the books are for the readers. Like, the books are for the people who find them. Like, I've met, like, with Remy Charlip, but I've met authors who make the books that I most love. You know, like, one of my favorite books is Michael Chabon's The Amazing Adventures of Cavalier and Clay. And I feel pretty confident that he wrote that book just for me, even though we hadn't met at the time. We've since met. But we all have that feeling, right? Like, when we really connect with a book, we feel like the author made that book just for us. And whenever someone says that to me – and I've been lucky enough to have people say that to me, to have readers tell me their experiences with my books – I always think, “Well, I did write it just for you.” Like, that's what it's really for. I'm working on another book now, and working on some adaptations for the screen and for the stage for some of my other books. So it's a constant thrill to see what might come along next. 

SARA: Definitely. And we will be awaiting to see what comes along next from you. Brian, I'm curious, for folks who are writers, creators, artists who come to you for advice, young people in particular, and I think about a lot of our queer young people, too, who might not trust that instinct in themselves, or might not think that that's a path for them, what advice would you have for them?

BRIAN: Yeah, there's a lot of jobs out there. Like, there's a lot of really interesting, weird things to do. And, like I wrote a book about the making of the movie of my book, Hugo, and I interviewed about 40 people on the set, from the dog trainer to Scorsese, about what they were like as kids, and how they got into what they do. And there were people who were employed for years making miniature magazines for parts of a model for a scene that was shot in miniature. There were people who were holding microphones and doing all of these jobs that I think a lot of us as young people don't know exist. And also we don't have to be one thing. Like, I think grown-ups have a tendency to ask young people what they want to be, as if there's one answer, which makes young people – you know, it's always annoying when we ask young people that question. But you don't have to be one thing. You can be a lot of things. And sometimes I think to myself, oh, I wish I came out earlier. I wish that I was able, like, I wish I wasn't afraid when I was afraid, and I do wish that, but that's not my story. Right? Like, my story is my story. And it turns out that the time I spent in the closet and the time I spent being afraid helped me to understand the world in an interesting way. Like, you learn something about the world when you're seeing two things at once, when you are projecting one thing that people believe about you, but secretly you're something else. That's information. That's an education that I think is actually very, very valuable. I wish that everyone could be who they are as soon as they recognize it, and that they are in a family where they are accepted and in a community where they're accepted. And a lot of people are, which is really, really wonderful. But a lot of people aren't. And it can be really hard. Right? Like, that can be really difficult. But I think the important thing is to keep going and to just observe. Right? Just to take things in as information. Because I do think if you keep going, there will come a point where you will realize the value in what you have experienced, and that includes the pain. Right? And it took me a lot of pain to figure that out. And it doesn't make the pain, like, when you're in it, feel better. It's not like the pain hurts less. But I do find value in knowing that the pain I have had in the past benefits me in a way that is actually, like, truly good. And also, like, what I was saying before about, you know, my process, where I felt bad all the time about myself, even when my books were successful, that was great. But what's really important to me is the time when I'm at my desk working on a new book. And if that's not going well, I would feel bad. And just recognizing, like you said, that we all have different processes, and there is no right way or wrong way to – I'm aware that we can't help feeling sadness, or feeling bad. But I think we sometimes compound the sadness by feeling upset that we're sad, or feeling, or wishing we weren't sad, or feeling bad about feeling bad. It's like, okay, I can't make the sadness go away at the core. But I can just feel it and not feel bad about feeling bad. I try to accept that. So I tend to not want to give advice, but I'm happy to share things I've learned over the years, and if any of it does end up being helpful, great. Because we do ultimately have to figure all this stuff out for ourselves. I have found value in listening to other people talk about their journeys. And it's like we pick and choose our lives in so many ways. And we pick and choose, oh, that's helpful, that's not helpful. I see this person's trying to help me, or they think they're trying to help me, but it's actually extremely destructive and negative. So, I'm going to just not pay attention to that if I can, and move my attention over here. That's all part of it, and we all deal with some version of it. You know, there's still lots of struggles right now, but I do find that these things that I've come to understand can help me when I'm feeling the bad parts. 

SARA: Yeah, you've given us some beautiful wisdom for all of us, at any stage of life. Right? The awareness that we don't have to be one thing. And what a beautiful lesson that is in the lives of queer folks, too, right? And in this day and age of our ever-evolving understanding of queer identity, and that it isn't just one thing. And that your own story, with all of its struggles and pain, can birth something incredible. That our stories have something to teach us. So, thank you for those nuggets. This has been a really beautiful conversation. I so enjoy your work and have so enjoyed listening to the behind-the-scenes stories of your work. But before we go, we have two final questions that we like to ask all of our guests at the end of every episode. And the first question has to do with the Mama Dragon's name. Mama Dragons came about out of a sense of fierceness, and a kind of fierce protection for our kids. And so we like to ask our guests, what is it you are fierce about?

BRIAN: That's a good question, and I do love the name Mama Dragons very much. And I do appreciate everything it evokes. And I'd like to think that I'm fierce about my work. I'm fierce about what I make. I know what I want to make, but I also know I need help. And so I have great collaborators, like we were talking about collaborators for things other than books earlier. But I should say, all my books are collaborations. I work with great editors, I work with great designers. And they help me. And they push me to make something I may not have known I had within me. You know, like, I am pushed. But I'm fierce about what I feel is right for my stories and for my art.  And I feel like I'm very proud to be fierce about supporting queer young people and making work – especially, like with Runaway With Me, like we were talking about – that is about saying we have a history. You can try to erase us. But you can get rid of the T and the B from LGBTQ. But you're not getting rid of bisexual and transsexual people, you're not getting rid of any of us. We all exist. We have always existed. That's what history has shown me. We just have more words for it now. And we have language with which we can talk about things that we couldn't talk about previously. So, a lot of people just knew what they were, but didn't have any way to formally think about it or discuss it, they just were who they were. And so I feel very fierce about connecting that history and not backing down in the face of everything that's coming at us right now. And letting young people know that all the adults in their lives need to be Mama Dragons now. And need to be fierce for them.

SARA: That's beautiful. Thank you. The last question that we like to ask our guests is, what is bringing you joy right now? Recognizing that, especially in these times when we need to cultivate as much joy as possible. 

BRIAN: That is very important, because joy can feel at odds with everything that's going on.

SARA: Truly. 

BRIAN: And I know sometimes people might feel guilty if they're enjoying something right now. But oh my gosh, you are so correct, and we do have to experience joy. And it's funny, because the first thing that's coming to my mind is my work again. So for, like as hard as the process has been, I have real joy in the fact that I can sit down every day at my desk, or if I'm doing research out in the world somewhere, and work to make a new story appear, to have something exist that wouldn't have existed without me having made it. And I take great joy in my friends. I had dinner the other night with a group of friends who I've known since college. And it was one of those evenings where the conversation just flowed so nicely, and we all knew so much about each other. None of us talked about work. We just talked about life, and we talked about the past, and we talked about the future, and we talked about things that were difficult. But it was just -- I just felt great, and we laughed. Oh my god, we laughed so hard, so I felt great joy in them, and in the community. And my husband also brings me great joy. And again, laughing with him, and knowing that it's okay to laugh and to feel that joy.

SARA: I want to add one thing, because I read something recently on the Freedom to Read website, which is profiles, banned book lists and things. And it was sort of a list of books to help you get through the times. Like, almost like escapist, but, like, if you want this kind of good story, and listening to you now just made me think of that, and how your work brings so much joy. Your books are places we can turn to for immersive experiences to kind of let go of all of the stuff that is swirling around us, and just kind of dive into some beautiful, beautiful story. So thank you for that and for the joy that you have brought into this world.

BRIAN: Thank you so much.

SARA: You're so welcome.

BRIAN: And thanks for what you're doing. I really appreciate it, and I'm just so happy to be In the Den with you today.

SARA: Likewise, Brian. Thank you. 

BRIAN: Thank you. 

SARA: Thank you so much for joining us here In the Den. Did you know that Mama Dragons offers an eLearning program called Parachute? This is an interactive learning platform where you can learn more about how to affirm, support, and celebrate the LGBTQ+ people in your life. Learn more at mamadragons.org/parachute. Or find the link in the episode show notes under links. 

If you enjoyed this episode, we hope you’ll take a moment to tell your friends and leave us a positive rating and review wherever it is you listen. Good reviews make us more visible and help us reach more folks who could benefit from being part of this community. And if you’d like to help Mama Dragons in our mission to support, educate, and empower the parents of LGBTQ+ children, please donate at mamadragons.org or click the donate link in the show notes. For more information on Mama Dragons and the podcast, you can follow us on Instagram or Facebook or visit our website mamadragons.org.