A new project at last !!!

[Jax]

Well, its been over a year since JMS announced that his new Babylon 5 feature film project, 'The Memory of Shadows', was sadly no longer going to happen.
Since then, as well as Richard Biggs, we've sadly lost Andreas Katsulas as well. All hopes for new B5 stuff seemed to be gone.

Well finally, that seems to have changed. :flash:
The following quotes are from the JMSnews forum by members who went to the latest Comic Convention where JMS attended. He announced:

…WB came to him as they do periodically wanting to do something with B5. They asked if he wanted to do a feature film but JMS declined mainly because he can’t yet picture structuring a B5 movie “…as long as Andreas and Rick insist on staying dead.” Maybe in a year or two he’ll be able to but right now he can’t do something big. What JMS suggested was a bunch of short films—little mini-movies, an anthology show set in the Babylon 5 universe. They said, “Okay.” There’s a network already interested in carrying them but they’re also planned for direct to DVD. This will be “Babylon 5 – The Lost Tales", a lot of small stories that never made it into the series that he’s rediscovered notes for. And JMS wants no interference, complete creative support – in writing. They said, “Okay.” And JMS wants to direct them. They said, “Okay.” The first will be three individual stories about three of the main characters (to be determined). The plan is to shoot in September, post-production Oct.-Dec. and they’ll probably come out the second quarter of 2007.

To the other questions that have arisen: we're looking at 3 half-hour episodes/stories for the first DVD, with additional features and the like in the other half hour. Each story will be worked around a given established character, the specifics of which are still TBD contingent upon availabilities and other issues.
We have a budget, we're greenlit, we're going.

As for what prompted the interest now at WB...it's only recently that they've finally run through all 5 seasons, which for many years now has been a constant source of revenue, and I think they would love to have something to continue to with. The recent news re: Changeling probably didn't hurt, but the deal was actually being negotiated long before there *was* a feature film deal with Imagine. As I recall, we finalized the deal right around the time that the Imagine news was announced.

It was a rather extraordinary 24 hours.

I held off saying anything until I was cleared by WB to announce it as a go project. Ultimately, whether we shoot in Vancouver or elsewhere will be a function of the deal that gets made locally.

NB, to clarify, the Changeling thing he talks about, is a new movie he has written and sold to Ron Howard. (which will make him an A-list writer at last. This should help give him a bit more clout when it comes to making the projects he wants to make, like maybe, finishing Crusade.)

[Mariel]

COOOOOL!!!!!
I just hope it doesn't fall through like the B5 movie. There are so many untold stories that I would love to hear.
:blpaw:

[philoSCIFI]

OMG! Comic Con is like the answer to everything that goes through the minds of the fans during summer hiatus! Thanks for posting the news! I'm looking forward to hearing more about it as well as seeing it all happen... eventually.

Also good to hear about the script he sold to Ron Howard.

[Jax]

Originally posted by philoSCIFI
Also good to hear about the script he sold to Ron Howard.

Yes it's great news for him. Sounds like a wierd situation reading through his latest post :

I am living in such strange times right now. So I figured I'd share
them.

Prior to the announcement of "Changeling," my film agent tried to get
me to understand what would happen in the aftermath of that
announcement, even though he said "you really won't get it until you're
in it."

I had no idea.

See, there's a real class structure to this industry. A list directors
only buy scripts from A list writers. That's kind of the rule, with
very few exceptions. I've been working in the TV business for over
twenty years, but in features I'm kind of an unknown equation. Always
have been, mainly because I really haven't sought it out much; I figure
films are like going to Vegas, you can invest years in one shot at the
dice. So I stick to TV. I thus have not been in that class of A list
writer. Nowhere near.

When Imagine and Ron Howard bought that script, the effect was
electric. Suddenly everybody in town wanted to know who the hell was
this guy they'd never heard of who just sold a script to Howard and, in
essence, jumped the line from "who?" to A-list without much in-between.
Twenty years in TV, now suddenly an overnight success.

Within hours of the announcement, every studio in town was calling my
agent to get a copy of the script. As it got read, they started
calling to set up meetings. Not us calling them. Them calling us.

And then the offers started. Rewrite offers. Original film offers.
Adaptations. I've had no less than one and in many cases two or three
studio meetings every day for the last several weeks, and my calendar
is one big mass of black type for the next four weeks. A big-budget
feature that Sony wants me to rewrite because it has to go into
production fast, one that Universal wants developed, on and on and
on...all I have to do is say yes to whichever ones I want and they're
mine. Everything I've ever written is suddenly being pored over and
optioned.

I have never seen anything like it. I've read about this sort of
thing, but to experience it personally is...strange, so strange. The
stuff I've had out there before, the novels and short stories and the
like, are all exactly what they were before this...the words didn't
change on the page, the stories didn't alter, but suddenly the
*context* in which they are being seen has changed radically.

I'm being very, very careful and very selective in what I say yes to,
because I want to make sure whatever I take on adds to rather than
subtracts from the momentum we've now achieved.

The really odd thing is that I'm not running around, jumping up and
down, celebrating or hooting or hollaring or any of that. It's moved
me in the other direction, I've gotten really, really quiet, and
careful. It's like all of my antennae are up. Everybody around me is
thrilled, and can't figure out why I'm being so reserved. I'm not
really sure myself, to be honest. Just a strange sort of wariness,
like when I'd move to a new neighborhood as a kid and I'd go quiet
while I sussed out the area.

Odd. Nothing bad, it's all to the good, lord knows. Just odd. Very
odd.

jms

And, just to get back on topic, he clarifies:

> So is television writing and production behind you now, or does your
> clout in Hollywood give you that many more options for the small screen?
>

It seems to be the latter. Funny, innit?

jms

And the new Bab5 stuff:

it's closer to one-half-hour per story, so figure about 75-90
minutes per DVD, plus additional material adding up to a two-hour DVD.


jms