PWCW: Speaking of Hollywood, how is the Song of Ice and Fire HBO show progressing?
GRRM: The writers on that have just completed the first draft of the script, so were waiting to hear what HBO thinks of it. Its very early in the process, so theres no telling. Therell be rewrites, and therell be changes. It may not get the green light and actually be filmed. All of that is part of the process of developing something for television, which is slow, but were at the beginning of the road in any case.
Once again, you get a little nervous that it doesnt get messed up. Television has a checkered record. Something like the Dune miniseries that was on the Sci-Fi Channel was a wonderful adaptation. They really did a beautiful, beautiful job with Dune.
But then again, the same people did Ursula Le Guins Earthsea, and it was terrible. Ursula had to write letters disowning itthey just messed it up totally. They changed things, moved things around and made it really dumb. So you never know whats going to come out. But if something of the quality level of the Dune adaptation comes out, that would be wonderful.
And once again, as with comics, Ive got great people involved. The screenwriters are David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, and Ive had several meetings with them. They really know the books, they love the books, theyre determined to do a faithful adaptation, and theyre both terrific writers in their own right. Both of them are also novelists and short story writers, so Ive sampled some of their own prose work, which was first-rate. So I think Im in good hands.
