I can't believe it made me feel
really trippy and old, and I kind of am,
but backstage we were talking about
it's been 10 years since Glee hit the air.
I know, I know.
But I am still in my twenties.
(audience laughs) I just wanna
put that out there, yes.
So am I, Chris.
(laughs)
Does it seem like that decade flew by for you?
It did, I mean it was a trip, man.
It's crazy, it's one of those experiences like,
it feels like it was yesterday,
but it also feels like it was 100 years ago.
Exactly, at the same time, it's like, it's a paradox.
Kinda like raising a kid, I imagine.
I just have dogs.
Yeah, me too.
I'm just a dogger.
So do people still stop you, fans of Glee,
and do they still react the same way?
Oh yeah of course, of course.
People will also, they'll just scream
"Glee" at me in public, which I'm like,
what am I supposed to - "oh yes?"
(audience laughs) Like what do they expect?
How are you supposed to respond to that, right?
Right, like "oh yeah, good observation."
(laughs) I don't know what to do.
Yes!
Yeah, yes, true. (laughs)
So how did you make the transition
from actor to author and I mean, congratulations,
New York Times bestselling author is not easy to do
(audience applauds) in this day and age.
Thank you so much, thank you.
I'm so happy people are still buying books
and reading books, right? Me too, me too,
right, absolutely, especially kids.
Yeah, books are so important to me, you know,
I bought my apartment that I live in today
because of its proximity to the Strand bookstore.
Oh, cool.
My favorite place in the world.
Yeah, it was my happy place too when I was a kid, yeah.
So how did you get into becoming an author?
Well it's funny, when I was a kid,
writing and acting was all the same thing to me,
because it was all - One extension,
it's all about stories. Exactly, right.
It's all like playing pretend in a variety of ways,
and I started writing my Land of Stories series,
which was the big series that came before this.
What is this?
Oh, yeah! The Land of Stories!
Yes, when I was a kid I started writing
The Land of Stories and this is a drawing that I drew
when I was about seven or eight,
and so then later in life I got lucky and I was on -
It came true!
It came true, yeah, and so -
That's incredible, (audience applauds)
you were seven or eight? Yeah, pretty crazy.
Oh my God, I'm gonna cry.
I know, it's great. (laughs)
And that's The Land of Stories
is the New York Times bestselling book,
and now it's becoming a film, yes?
It is, yes.
(screams)
Yeah, crazy right? (audience applauds)
Pretty cool.
Yeah I'm very excited, very excited about that.
So what's that like?
So intimidating! They come to you
and they say, oh, right?
Are you gonna direct?
I am gonna direct it, yeah. Oh, wow.
So yeah that was - I really really held onto that,
I did not wanna give it to someone else
to decide. Well you've been
dreaming this since you were seven.
Exactly, exactly, so I really -
Who else could possibly know this?
I know, I know, and sometimes, you know,
they get a director in there that doesn't quite
get the world and is, you know, using it
as a stepping stone to get an Avengers movie
or something. Right, right, exactly.
So I didn't want that to happen with this.
You want this to be the passion of the director.
Yeah, and I want it to be what the kids know it to be,
I want, you know, the sets and the costumes
to be what the kids are expecting.
Well give everybody the setup
for The Land of Stories, 'cause this is the prequel
to The Land of Stories. Yes, yeah.
So The Land of Stories is about a pair
of brother and sister twins,
who inherit a magical storybook
and enter the fairytale world.
And they have all these adventures
with fairytale characters.
And this is, although it acts as a prequel
but I have to tell people, you do not have to read
The Land of Stories to read this, yeah, yeah.
When I first started writing this,
I thought it was gonna be a very simple prequel,
I think I was gonna call it The Land Before Stories
or something cheesy like that.
But it just, I felt the need,
because the state of the world,
to really try to write a story
that would empower kids and teach them how to triumph
over prejudice and sexism and other discrimination,
and so it really took on -
And that's the magic.
That's the magic, yeah.
That's the real magic. So it really took on
a life of its own, yeah. That's beautiful.
I hope I get new readers with this one.
(audience applauds) Aw!
So A Tale of Magic, I'm sure it's going
to be yet another New York Times bestseller.
(audience cheering)