HBO gave ASoIaF pilot the greenlight

[Dragoon]

[Dragoon]

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George R.R. Martin, on his Livejournal (not a) blog:
HBO has given the production order.

They will be filming the pilot episode of A GAME OF THRONES.

It's just the pilot so far. They'll need to see that before they decide whether to proceed with a full season's episodes. So let's all hope the pilot will kick serious ass.

It should. David Benioff and Dan Weiss did a terrific job with the script. And yes, all of you can relax, it's very faithful. Dan and David will be the executive producers for the pilot and (we hope) the eventual series.

More details when I have 'em. The news is very fresh. HBO just issued their own press release, which should be up on their website soon, if it's not there already.

Winter is coming to HBO. Hot damn.
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About time.
 
AWESOME, hopefully it airs around the same time Dance of Dragons comes out

oh wait never
 
Interesting. I hope this is actually good. And if it's not I only have to wait a few years for the next book :cheese:
 
Um... info for the unenlightened?
 
Its pretty much the best fantasy series ever written. EVER. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Song_of_Ice_and_Fire


I am so god damned stoked for this holy shit. WANT WANT WANT

Unfortunately I dont get HBO at my shitty apartment so I cant really support it. I have to download it.

Unless it comes out like 4 months from now when I move out.
 
http://winter-is-coming.blogspot.com/


This is a blog with news about the pilot. So far they're mostly posting about potential castings for certain characters but its got other info on there too. Definately something to keep an eye on.


And heres an awesome bit of info that got me all excited again:

One last thing: our focus at the moment is on casting the pilot. So we're only worried about characters who appear in the pilot. Just so you know the pilot parameters, here's the first line of dialogue:

"We should start back."

And here's the last line:

"The things I do for love."
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Awesome.

Holy zombie jesus in heaven eating brains they better not **** this up the way SciFi did with that corny Earthsea adaptation.
If it's done well this WILL be omgwtfbbqBADASS.
 
I really doubt it will be ****ed up. GRRM is directly working with them, and HBO has a great track record. The biggest thing is that they also have other pilots and potential series' coming out at the same time which may make HBO decide to cut aSoIF in order to keep things manageable.
 
I hear nothing but good things about these books. I think I may ask for them for Christmas, or buy them in Jan sometime. I gotta finish Homicide yet, but still.
 
Everyone needs to check out that blog I linked to before. The guy who runs the site was given the script to the pilot and he posted some details on it (spoilers if you havent read the books) as well as his own thoughts on it. Sounds very, very awesome.
 
Yes, I was getting around to posting this. Thank you, Krynn. The script does look very promising.

Interesting that they're keeping Daenerys. She will be by far the most expensive sequences to shoot. If they cancel the series before Season 4, when Daenerys finally starts meeting other viewpoint characters, all of Dany's scenes will seem rather pointless. Even with my high hopes, said cancellation is likely, and I would have honestly just cut her.
 
Of course they're keeping Dany, her story is essential.
 
Yeah, I know Dany's essential to the overarching 7-book plot, but what I'm saying is, odds are this will be canceled within 3 seasons. Dany's scenes up until that point will seem completely pointless. You read the books knowing that, yes, this will be relevant, yes, this will connect to the larger story eventually. I am glad GRRM put her in, if she just showed up out of nowhere in Book 5, the fans would be WTF, who is this chick? Yet if the series gets canned halfway through, well then...her scenes will have been irrelevant and not affecting the overarching plot in any way.

If I ran things? Say a miracle happens and the first three seasons are smashing successes. I would then film a spinoff miniseries of Dany. All her chapters in Books 1-3 can fill one standard season. That brings us up to date just in time for the Season 4 AFFC/ADWD premiere.
 
According to the blog posted earlier, Winter Is Coming, HBO has picked up 3 new series: How to Make It in America, Bored to Death, and Hung. People seem to believe HBO is planning to pick up a total of 6 new series, and all 3 of these are comedies which wouldn't put them in direct competition with A Game of Thrones, so that may leave 3 open slots.

A list, perhaps not complete, of other pilots in production, being considered, or already chosen by HBO (from a post on Westeros.org, posted by Ran):

--- Greenlit:

How to Make it in America Single-camera comedy from Mark Wahlberg's production company. Reported on here. Picked up by HBO in mid-December. (GREENLIT)

Hung Dark comedy about a well-endowed former basketball coach. First of the new slate of shows to be greenlit to series. (GREENLIT)

Bored to Death Jason Schwartzman comedy about an alcoholic writer pretending to be a private inspector. Picked up by HBO in mid-December. (GREENLIT)

--- Still in the running:

The Washingtonienne A sex comedy set on Capitol Hill

Treme Contemporary urban drama set in post-Katrina New Orleans, by David Simon (of The Wire)

Boardwalk Empire - A drama set in 1920's Atlantic City, Scorsese attached as executive producer, one of the Sopranos producers also involved.

Suburban Shootout Barry Sonnenfeld set to direct the pilot, based on a British dark comedy

Untitled Kanye West Project Don't know much about this; mentioned in passing here. Seems to be a comedy type of thing, given the comedian that's been cast in a role.

Gentlemen of Leisure Drama about prostitution in America.

The Wonderful Maladys Half-hour show about three screwy adult siblings who lost their parents at a young age. Starring Sarah Michelle Gellar, apparently. The pilot is likely to shoot early next year.

--- Canceled, passed over, etc:

Last of the Ninth Drama concerning police corruption in 1970's New York City, a David Milch project. Reported to be out of contention.

1% A drama about the Hell's Angels biker gang. It was reported that HBO had passed on it as of October 31 (via W. Earl Brown on his Myspace page). There was a copyright infringement suit launched against HBO and the writer, which may have been a factor.

Diary of a Manhattan Call Girl Darren Star project, based I guess on Tracy Quan's semi-autobiographical novel. Huh, an old interview from Haaretz in February indicates that this show has serious problems going forward, thanks to Showtime apparently grabbing a similar program in a move that Star suggests was intended to try and shutter his project. Later articles still mention it on the slate, but it may be that it's pretty much dead in the water.
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Updates:

Northern Ireland has been chosen as a shooting location (with rumors of Scotland and Morocco as additional shooting locations), and filming is set to start in October. They've been given free use of Paint Hall, a film studio in N. Ireland, and a million dollar grant on the condition that they hire at least $4.8m in local cast/crew.

Some time yesterday, I think, they announced a director (Tom McCarthy) and the actor who will play Tyrion Lannister (Peter Dinklage).
 
They haven't even started filming yet?! WHAT THE ****. :(
 
Lucid said:
They haven't even started filming yet?! WHAT THE ****. :(
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These things take time. It probably seems like it's taking longer than usual because we heard about the project right at the beginning, rather than some time during production.

With any luck, they'll have a finished pilot by the end of the year or early next year (not sure which is more likely), HBO will order the rest of the season, and we'll be watching A Game of Thrones in 2010.
 
Actual filming time will be minimal. It's pre and post production hell they'll be going through. What kind of air date will we be looking at, though? I don't think HBO will do the go ahead before airing it to the public... when do HBO normally air pilots?
 
Viperidae said:
Actual filming time will be minimal. It's pre and post production hell they'll be going through. What kind of air date will we be looking at, though? I don't think HBO will do the go ahead before airing it to the public... when do HBO normally air pilots?
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I don't know much about the TV business, but I was under the impression that pilots were generally only seen by executives and not aired until/unless the series is picked up and aired.

Edit: From the Winter is Coming blog:

Tremé shot in 17 days, Boardwalk Empire's filming is scheduled to last 50 days. I would guess that Thrones would be somewhere in the vicinity of 3-4 weeks. Assuming that they start filming in Oct, wrap in Nov, give them two months of post-production and we are looking at a final decision by HBO in Jan/Feb 2010.
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Darkside55 said:
This is the most predictable casting ever. Not saying it's bad--by any means--just that it was a given.
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He was the top choice in pretty much every casting discussion at Westeros.org (ASoIaF fan site), and probably elsewhere as well. I think he'll make a great Tyrion.
 
Darkside55 said:
Me too. They'll have to ugly him up a lot, though.
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134632__dinklage_l.jpg


Indeed. Though they could easily just leave him as is. I don't recall it being vital to the plot that he be grotesque, except of course---

when he loses part of his nose, and all that.

Edit: "Tyrion is a misshapen dwarf with stunted legs, a jutting forehead, mismatched eyes of green and black, and lank, white-blonde hair. When he grows a beard, it contains both blonde and black hair."

Nothing too difficult there, I think.
 
All they'd have to do is raise one eyebrow with prosthetics and it would look convincing enough.
 
Viperidae said:
All they'd have to do is raise one eyebrow with prosthetics and it would look convincing enough.
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And dye his hair/facial hair, obviously. And colored contacts for the mismatched eye colors.

I can only think of a handful of characters that would need any serious prosthetics, especially in the first episode/season. The Hound, primarily, with his burn scars.
 
Oh wow, it turns out I had been imagining him wrong all along. I always read it as 'mismatched eyes, with different colours,' instead of 'mismatched eyes of different colours'; I thought his eyes were misshapen.

They'll need cg if they want to show Ilyn Payne's mouth, unless they could do it easier with makeup. They'll need some taped ears for Gared if they do the prologue. Maybe some scars for Jon's arm.

But as you said, srs prosthetics will only apply to Sandor.
 
Lucid said:
They haven't even started filming yet?! WHAT THE ****. :(
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Well there's the script to adapt and finalise. Casting. Crew. Locations to find. Not to mention costumes, props and sets all to made or bought. Even though it was given the greenlight back in November, a lot of these things can and do change from the time its given a greenlight to the time its in production.

A lot of what goes into the pre-production proposal thats submitted to studio's is all just paper work that proves you know how you'd go about making the tv show, with some (if not most) steps already sorted out as to who is playing what role and so on. However, people can drop out or change their mind, or other work commitments get in the way, or the producers lie about whom they've got involved in the project in order to get it greenlit.

I'd say the most likely scenario is the scale of the production requiring lots of time and effort being put into costumes and props being made and sets being built on location. Not to mention, you'd need at least close to a month of rehearsal. Since Tom McCarthy is also an actor, he'll definitely take his time to get all the actors completely in their roles as he has with his independent films. The guy knows his stuff.

In the end, even when its all planned out and prepared for, it still takes a shit load of time to do something like this. The Pacific was in pre-production for about 2 years before they started filming for almost 6 months. ****ing huge production.
 
Viperidae said:
Oh wow, it turns out I had been imagining him wrong all along. I always read it as 'mismatched eyes, with different colours,' instead of 'mismatched eyes of different colours'; I thought his eyes were misshapen.
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That's how I was imagining him too. Like Quasimodo.
 
[Dragoon] said:
Updates:

Northern Ireland has been chosen as a shooting location (with rumors of Scotland and Morocco as additional shooting locations), and filming is set to start in October. They've been given free use of Paint Hall, a film studio in N. Ireland, and a million dollar grant on the condition that they hire at least $4.8m in local cast/crew.
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I think that's in/near Belfast.

I feel sorry for the cast and crew :(
 
Sparta said:
Well there's the script to adapt and finalise. Casting. Crew. Locations to find. Not to mention costumes, props and sets all to made or bought. Even though it was given the greenlight back in November, a lot of these things can and do change from the time its given a greenlight to the time its in production.

A lot of what goes into the pre-production proposal thats submitted to studio's is all just paper work that proves you know how you'd go about making the tv show, with some (if not most) steps already sorted out as to who is playing what role and so on. However, people can drop out or change their mind, or other work commitments get in the way, or the producers lie about whom they've got involved in the project in order to get it greenlit.

I'd say the most likely scenario is the scale of the production requiring lots of time and effort being put into costumes and props being made and sets being built on location. Not to mention, you'd need at least close to a month of rehearsal. Since Tom McCarthy is also an actor, he'll definitely take his time to get all the actors completely in their roles as he has with his independent films. The guy knows his stuff.

In the end, even when its all planned out and prepared for, it still takes a shit load of time to do something like this. The Pacific was in pre-production for about 2 years before they started filming for almost 6 months. ****ing huge production.
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Meh, I just remembered reading about this a few years ago and I guess it does make sense that it's taking a long time.
Considering it's a war epic and all.
 
Yes, HBO has been holding auditions for the pilot of A GAME OF THRONES. In London, in Ireland, even in LA.
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(Note that this was part of a joke post on Martin's blog, so it might have been part of the joke. Doesn't seem like it though)

Also, unrelated to the series:

Cyanide Studios, an independent videogame developer based in Nanterre, France, has acquired an exclusive option to develop Ice & Fire as both an RTS (Real Time Strategy) and RPG videogame for next generation consoles and PC.
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Full post here.
 
Lucid said:
Meh, I just remembered reading about this a few years ago and I guess it does make sense that it's taking a long time.
Considering it's a war epic and all.
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I'm an idiot, I thought this was the thread for that new Band of Brothers miniseries. D'oh.
 
noooooo....i have to read the books first. cause if the movie comes out first then i'll never gonna get down to reading.
 
Also, its a tv show not a movie.

Also, WHEN THE **** IS GRRM GOING TO FINISH DANCE WITH DRAGONS? JESUS ****!
 
He's lazy. And spends a lot of time writing about football on his blog. Man's got priorities.
 
Oh, this is exciting. Although, potentially, disappointing. Anyone remember the Screw-On Head pilot? Remember how awesome it was? Remember how Sci-Fi never actually continued it?

I haven't actually read the books. I'm just interested in the idea of them and have heard great things about them. I guess I should probably read them before this pilot happens. Or should I?!?
 
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