Ever since John Hindman was ten years old, he has wanted to make movies. Since then, he has performed as a stand-up comic in the San Francisco Bay Area and worked in L.A. both in front of and behind the camera. After working as a writer for hire, he began writing his own scripts. And four screenplays later, he finally got the chance to sit in the director's chair and bring his own screenplay to life.

"I set about writing a story that would be the kind of movie that I would like to see. For me than meant getting personal," says Hindman. "I poured every bit of my life into that story although nothing in the movie actually happened."

In 2007, that screenplay was included on the Blacklist, a year-end list of the most well-liked, unproduced screenplays in Hollywood. This July, its story comes to the big screen as The Answer Man, a movie about one man who supposedly has all the answers, an eclectic variety of individuals looking for answers, and what happens when their lives collide.

Courtesy of a San Francisco publicist, I was able to sit down with Hindman while he was in town and talk about The Answer Man, its questions, its answers, and what it is any of us know in the first place.

HJ: Great to have you here this morning. Thank you for coming to see us in San Francisco.

JH: Thank you for wanting to talk to me.

HJ: You're welcome. So, The Answer Man—very intriguing film, a comedy, but one that deals with some pretty serious themes, and also your first film. Now, you've said that you've wanted to make films since you were ten years old—

JH: Correct.

HJ: So this first film has been a bit of a long time coming. In what ways would you say The Answer Man is the first film you thought you would make, and in what ways did it surprise you?

JH: Well, it's surprised me that it worked out at all. That was a huge surprise. And no, it's not the one I thought I would make first. Nothing ever happens the way that you think that it's going to, or the way that you think it should. The Answer Man was the fourth screenplay that I had written, and it was the one that I thought was the least likely to be made.

HJ: Any particular reason?

JH: Yeah, it was just really personal to me. Everything that I loved, I put in that screenplay. Movie monsters, coffee, every little thought I had—like about like how come when kids get a good grade, it's a four and not a one—all these little personal things of mine. I thought that my family and I would love it, but ironically, I guess by being that personal, it reached the largest audience that I had up to that point.

HJ: I think that there definitely is power in being personal because we are all personal beings.

JH: They say if you are trying to write a story about everyone, then you write a story about no one; if you write a story about one person, then you tell a story about everyone&ellips; some version of that.

HJ: Like you said, this is a very personal story with many of its details and themes are drawn from your life&ellips; Where exactly did Arlan Farber come from?

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