The following podcast is sponsor content from HBO Documentary Films.

It is February 1st, and I have a date.

Lina Dunham.

Hello.

Good heavens.

How are you? Hi, and welcome to the official companion podcast for the new HBO documentary.

It's me, Hillary, the man who drew Eloise.

This is my friend Hillary Knight.

He is an illustrator, an artist.

He drew Eloise, the little girl that lives at the plaza, but he's done a lot of other things as well.

My name is Hugo Lindgren. And joining me in our New York studio is the man himself, artist and writer Hillary Knight.

Welcome, Hillary.

Well, thank you. Happy to be here.

Also joining us is Matt Wolfe, the director of the documentary, which debuts March 23rd on HBO.

Hello, Matt. Hey, how are you? Very good.

So it was 1955, when the world got its first glimpse of an incorrigible six-year-old girl who lived at the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan.

She had a knack for getting into all kinds of trouble. Eloise's adventures were written by actress and socialite Kay Thompson,

but I'm sure the image you have in your head right now is of a girl with unruly hair, a bright red bow, suspenders, and a slightly protruding belly careening down the plaza's rarefied hallways.

That image was drawn by my guest here, Hillary Knight, who worked side by side with his friend Thompson to create the indelible character of Eloise.

Thompson and Knight collaborated on five books in the series,

the last of which was published after Thompson's death in 1998. But as we learn in Matt's documentary,

the same little girl who brought Thompson and Knight together eventually sparked a permanent

...