I knew that Weird Girl was going to be kind of amazing. The secret truth of Weird Girl is that I put her in there originally because I needed some way to set the boys' names.

I often say that a lot of my job, as a screenwriter, is sort of being a stock picker, in that I need to figure out what movies are probably going to get made because otherwise I'm spending a lot of my time on something that's trapped in 12-point courier. So, having Tim's interest in doing a movie is a huge asset. But, not everything shoots. I'm always grateful when those things do happen.

One of those strange things that happens in movies is that you need someone to actually say people's names, or else you have no idea who those kids are. This was a way for her to introduce who the important boys were in the story, but then it just was so funny that it became a centerpiece to it. When you look at the character design that Tim did for Weird Girl, and what Catherine [O'Hara] did with the voice, and it's gonna kill.

The producers and I first talked about the Big Fish musical, right before we did the first test screening of the movie. I said, "I think there's a Broadway musical here." And really, from that day, we started figuring out how we would do it.

Keeping the cat front-and-center was definitely a smart choice, from Tim and the animation department. Mr. Whiskers got referred to more than we actually saw him on stage. Seeing him on screen, you just love him.

Every once in awhile, Allison Abbate would drop a note and say, "It's going really well!," and I was like, "Great!" So, I had not seen it in about two years. They went off and started shooting, and I saw it all put together with almost the final sound mix and it was remarkable. I was so, so happy and relieved, not in the sense that I thought something had gone wrong, but you just don't know what something is going to be like until you see it put together. Everyone stepped up and brought their A+ game.

I just always remember myself as the teenager with questions about movies and screenwriting. I would hope that there was somebody out there who would answer those questions, and so, if I can take a few minutes to do it, I will. It's not threatening for us. We're not being stalked, so it's easier.