This is the start of my 5 quick questions interview series from Wizard World 2009. For the next four days I will be posting a different interview each day with a celebrity I was lucky enough to have the chance to ask a 5 quick questions.  For those of you that read my Waiting for Wizard World article you know one thing I was excited for was the chance to see Max Brooks author or World War Z do his “What’s your zombie plan?” Panel. I arrived at the con Friday sneaking out of work early and stopped by his table to pick up a hardback copy of World War Z to have signed. I told him I was a huge fan and asked him if I could have an interview sometime that weekend and he said “I am kinda slow now” luckily my friend Scott who blogs on 13visions.com had his H4 handy and me and Max snuck off to do the interview you see before you, check it out after the jump.

1. What was the genesis of the idea or the inspiration for World War Z?

The inspiration for World War Z was Studs Terkel’s the Good war. It’s an oral history of World War II, always loved the book and when it came time to write another zombie book I wanted to do it in his style.

2. With that in mind what was your templates for the zombies you used for the book?

The zombies were George Romero’s, although my zombies don’t evolve and they are a little dumber. The George Romero zombies have emotions, memories, they evolve and have skills like learning to use guns and things like that.
Mine don’t.

Mine are more zombified than George’s.

3. With the Format of the book, how much fun was it writing in that format? I had compared it to This American Life but a zombified version.

That’s a good thing. It’s a little like This American Life, hopefully my voice is not as annoying as Ira’s, but it might very well be.

4. How did you come up with some of the zombie scenarios in the book? For instance the frozen zombies and the zombies who attack the ship from under the water I thought alot  of these ideas were ground breaking to the genre?

Basically…… I thought about zombies way to much, and it’s that simple. I just thought about what if I got on a boat? What would they do? Or what about when it snowed?  What would happen to the zombies I just let my mind…. I didn’t let my mind it just went there wether I wanted it to or not and I just came up with all these different scenarios. Most people who write about zombies are genuine cool writers, who just happen to write about zombies, I am actually a zombie nerd a bionafied zombie nerd and that is where is all comes from.

5A. I have been hearing a lot about the World War Z movie being on hold could you tell me a bit about this?

Okay they have decided to make it a musical on ice, it will be directed by Michael Bay, It will be starring Shia LaBeouf. No I have no idea. Here’s who you can ask you can ask

Mark Forester(Apparatus Productions, 6533 Hollywood Blvd, Ste 411, Los Angeles, CA 90028 Phone: 310-424-1300 Fax: 310-424-1309)

because he is directing it, so he knows more about the film than I do. Also

Jeremy Kleiner at plan B entertainment(9150 Wilshire Blvd., Ste. 350, Beverly Hills, CA 90210 Phone: 310-275-6135)

that’s Brad Pitt’s production company, they are the ones that optioned it and he is also the executive helming it or call

Paramount Pictures( 5555 Melrose Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90038 Phone: 323-956-5000)

They need to know not only do people want this film to be made, but they will pay to see it if it’s released.

5B. Aren’t  you worried about your source material World War Z with Hollywood getting ahold of it and dumbing it down for the massses because your book was a smart book to begin with?

I am not worried about them dumbing it down.
I KNOW THEY WILL, so I sleep very well knowing what’s going to happen. You know in Hollywood you can be so involved you end up tearing your hair out and wanting to kill yourself and going on a shooting spree or you can step back and let it happen and that is the only way I can keep my sanity, is let it happen. They are not going to give me any control anyway so why worry about something I have not control over. So that’s it.

5c. Is there a possibility of a sequel to World War Z?

You never know, I mean if Kevin Smith can make Clerks 2 and make it good and it was good I did like it. You never know. I am not going to rule it out…… or in.

Feel free to use the contact info and let them know you want to see World War Z.  I leave you with what Max wrote in my book.