John Green Says TFIOS Movie is Faithful to the Book

In an interview with USA Today, John Green said that the movie adaptation of The Fault in Our Stars is faithful to the book.

on the adaptation:

"I loved it. It's a wonderfully faithful adaptation," the author says.

on Shailene Woodley as Hazel:

He says Woodley "sounds and acts just like Hazel does in my mind." (Hazel is the novel's bookish and sarcastic narrator who's tethered to an oxygen tank.)

on Ansel Elgort as Gus:

Green says Elgort is "just so Gus." (Gus, or Augustus, is a former basketball star who falls in love with Hazel). "That's a hard role. Gus is very confident in many ways, but not entirely."

on the popularity of the novel:

"If you had pitched the idea to me on a plane, I would have said, 'That sounds horrible.' It's a story about illness, but it's not hopeless. Maybe that's what people are responding to. And I think they like the love story. It feels real to them."

on how he got the story of TFIOS:

He got the idea for the novel some 16 years ago while working as a student chaplain at a children's hospital in Columbus, Ohio. Green says he was "far too emotional to be a good chaplain — I cried too much," but that the experience changed his career plans. Rather than going to divinity school, he became a writer.