The Dialogue: An Interview with Screenwriter Nia Vardalos (2007)

NIA VARDALOS was nominated for the Academy Award® and the Writers Guild Award in 2003 for her breakthrough screenplay My Big Fat Greek Wedding, which was based on her one-woman play. The film became the highest-grossing independent feature and turned her in to an overnight success, spawning a follow-up sitcom and a cemented spot among Hollywood s elite writers. Listen as she talks candidly about her favorite laugh, tapping into her inner guy, and why her take on the hardest part of screenwriting just might make you blush.

Keywords: character-name-in-title, screenwriting, screenwriting-seminar, script-writer

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Vardalos, Nia Filmography

• Play in Full Screen Who's That Girl?

  2014, role: writer
• Play in Full Screen Helicopter Mom

  2014, role: actress , character name: Maggie
• Play in Full Screen Forget Me Not

  2014, role: actress , character name: Catherine
• Play in Full Screen Dealin' with Idiots

  2013, role: actress , character name: Ava Morris
• Play in Full Screen McKenna Shoots for the Stars

  2012, role: actress , character name: Mrs. Brooks
• Play in Full Screen For a Good Time, Call...

  2012, role: actress , character name: Rachel Rodman
• Play in Full Screen Booking Agents

  2011, role: writer
• Play in Full Screen Larry Crowne

  2011, role: writer
• Play in Full Screen The 2011 Independent Spirit Awards

  2011, role: actress , character name: Herself
• Play in Full Screen Booking Agents

  2011, role: actress , character name: Booking Agent
• Play in Full Screen Larry Crowne

  2011, role: actress , character name: Map Genie
• Play in Full Screen A Night of 140 Tweets: A Celebrity Tweet-A-Thon for Haiti

  2010, role: actress , character name: Herself
• Play in Full Screen Chit Chat

  2010, role: actress , character name: Herself
• Play in Full Screen I Hate Valentine's Day

  2009, role: writer
• Play in Full Screen I Hate Valentine's Day

  2009, role: director
• Play in Full Screen I Hate Valentine's Day

  2009, role: actress , character name: Genevieve Gernier
• Play in Full Screen I Hate Valentine's Day

  2009, role: writer
• Play in Full Screen My Life in Ruins

  2009, role: actress , character name: Georgia
• Play in Full Screen The Dialogue: An Interview with Screenwriter Nia Vardalos

  2007, role: actress , character name: Herself
• Play in Full Screen Greece: Secrets of the Past

  2006, role: actress , character name: Narrator
• Play in Full Screen Boffo! Tinseltown's Bombs and Blockbusters

  2006, role: actress , character name: Herself
• Play in Full Screen A Taxi Odyssey

  2005, role: producer
• Play in Full Screen Connie and Carla

  2004, role: producer
• Play in Full Screen Backstage with Connie and Carla

  2004, role: actress , character name: Connie
• Play in Full Screen Connie and Carla

  2004, role: actress , character name: Connie
• Play in Full Screen Debbie Reynolds: 'Connie and Carla'

  2004, role: actress , character name: Herself
• Play in Full Screen Dressing in Drag: 'Connie and Carla'

  2004, role: actress , character name: Herself
• Play in Full Screen The 2004 IFP/West Independent Spirit Awards

  2004, role: actress , character name: Herself - Performer
• Play in Full Screen 101 Biggest Celebrity Oops

  2004, role: actress , character name: Herself - #75: My Big Fat Greek Oops
• Play in Full Screen Connie and Carla

  2004, role: writer
• Play in Full Screen The 75th Annual Academy Awards

  2003, role: actress , character name: Herself - Nominee: Best Original Screenplay & Presenter: Best Makeup
• Play in Full Screen The 14th Annual Producers Guild of America Awards

  2003, role: actress , character name: Herself - Presenter
• Play in Full Screen 9th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards

  2003, role: actress , character name: Herself
• Play in Full Screen Hollywood Celebrates Denzel Washington: An American Cinematheque Tribute

  2003, role: actress , character name: Herself
• Play in Full Screen My Big Fat Greek Life

  2003, role: writer
• Play in Full Screen The 29th Annual People's Choice Awards

  2003, role: actress , character name: Herself
• Play in Full Screen The 60th Annual Golden Globe Awards

  2003, role: actress , character name: Herself - Nominee: Best Actress in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy
• Play in Full Screen My Big Fat Greek Wedding

  2002, role: writer
• Play in Full Screen My Big Fat Greek Wedding

  2002, role: actress , character name: Toula Portokalos
• Play in Full Screen Meet Prince Charming

  2002, role: actress , character name: Jennifer
• Play in Full Screen VH1 Big in 2002 Awards

  2002, role: actress , character name: Herself
• Play in Full Screen Sorority Sluts 3: Spring Break! (The Outtakes)

  2001, role: miscellaneous crew
• Play in Full Screen Short Cinema

  1998, role: actress
• Play in Full Screen Men Seeking Women

  1997, role: actress , character name: Iris
• Play in Full Screen No Experience Necessary

  1996, role: actress , character name: Sheila

Famous quotes by Nia Vardalos:

"I do recommend it for all girls, and boys, out there: put on a pair of fishnet stockings and find your inner sexiness!"

"In many ways we are all sons and daughters of ancient Greece."

"I've understood the desire for a sequel, because I hear it all the time from my family and everyone I run into at a Starbucks."

"I liked the title, and I wanted to explore the concept of this contrived holiday and what happens when romance is forced on us."

"Tom will play a man who is forced into a career change when he least expects it."

"You're not ethnic enough. You're not fat enough. You're not thin enough. You're not blond enough. You're not dark enough. You're not young enough. You're not old enough."

"Big Fat Greek Wedding"

"You only get one life so you might as well make it a happy one, and that's why I tend to just jump into things. I'm sort of a fearless idiot that way."

"When I used to do musical theatre, my dad refused to come backstage. He never wanted to see the props up close or the sets up close. He didn't want to see the magic."

"I have this theory of life that there are four popular people in high school and then there are the rest of us. I write movies for the rest of us who never peaked in high school. For the people that did peak in high school and then realized later that it's all downhill, welcome to the movie as well."

"I couldn't get an acting job to save my life when I moved to L.A."

"We live in an unsafe world."

"You're never too fat for a new purse."

"I'd been raised by my parents who taught me not to think you're better than you are."

"My daughter is a preschooler but I have only known her for a while. She is adopted."

"I don't card out my screenplays ever. I just have an idea I just sit down and write I don't edit."

"I think our skin clears up and we're nicer when you are in love."

"What I wish I had, is that I wish I was a little more Greek, in that I wish I could lose my North American driven attitude and that I could be a little bit more poetic and laissez faire."

"On the publicity tour of 'My Big Fat Greek Wedding,' I was asked over and over again, if, as the writer, I felt it was a fair depiction of real life to have someone of my er, below average looks, hook up with hottie John Corbett."

"I thought I was attractive when I shot 'My Big Fat Greek Wedding.' Studio executives and movie reviewers let me know I had a confidence in my looks that was not shared by them."

Nia Vardalos