'Theory of Everything' Kiwi screenwriter's lasting image of Hawking

The lasting image that the Kiwi screenwriter behind The Theory of Everything has of the late Stephen Hawking is his "big rock star smile".

Renowned theorist and physicist Stephen Hawking died on Wednesday at 76.

Speaking from Germany, Anthony McCarten told NZH Focus his first thoughts on hearing the news.

"If someone had told him at 21 years old that he would live another 55 years after he'd been given a two-year death sentence by doctors, he would have grabbed it," he says.

"My second reaction was he's free ...he's finally free of that damn wheelchair, from his breathing apparatus and four words a minute word communication and he's gone to his rightful place among the stars."

He refers to the final lines of Hawking's best-known book A Brief History of Time. "I can only think he's probably got his answer now."

In 2004, McCarten knocked on the door of Hawking's first wife, Jane, to ask for the rights to her autobiography, Travelling to Infinity.

He then went on to write the screenplay, inspired by her book, for the highly acclaimed 2014 film, The Theory of Everything, which earned him two Baftas and Academy Award nominations.

McCarten says Hawking's emotional reaction to watching the film for the first time still sticks with him.

"When the lights came up, a nurse wiped tears from his cheeks and he appeared to be very moved from the film. He typed into his computer the words 'broadly true'.

"I think his comment was that 'not all of it happened but it was completely true'... was his verdict on the film. And then he became a big supporter of it."

From there on, McCarten says he and Hawking became friends.

"Last time I saw him, I delivered a tribute to him from the stage and there he was.. and his face, often so inert, broke into his big rock star smile and that's my lasting image of him," he says.

"He was man who despite all of his afflictions of his disorder and his illness, always had a smile on his face. He's a role model for us all."