Free screenplays with The Times

The Times is giving away free screenplays this week, and to go with the offer they're talking to writers about their scripts.

• John Hodge on adapting Trainspotting from the novel by Irvine Welsh
  
• David Hare on adapting The Hours from Virginia Woolf's novel
• Tom Stoppard on writing Shakespeare In Love
• Lee Hall on writing Billy Elliot

With Billy Elliot I was involved with every detail, arguing for hours with Stephen. He had come from theatre so the atmosphere was very collegiate. It wasn’t a case of making big changes but small things to alter the emphasis. We didn’t get the broader political context of the miners’ strike in – frustrating, but we did get it into the stage play – because of the emotional balance of the film. Your screenplay will inevitably be f***ed up, but something good may come out of that f***ing up.