Word: scripting
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Niccol, a young New Zealander, wrote the script in 1993, and wrote and directed last year's swank science fable Gattaca, which has much the same story (in the near future, one human man is surrounded by handsome humanoids). Niccol says the only source material he needed for The Truman Show was his own paranoia. "I often felt people were lying to me," he declares. But as the '90s devolved into media spectacles of Bronco chases, freeway suicides and Jerry Springer grudge matches, the conceit of TV as worldwide psychodrama seemed prescient. "I used to think the idea was ludicrously...
Niccol sold his spec script to the world's savviest producer, Scott Rudin (In & Out, Clueless, The First Wives Club), who took it straight to Carrey. "Jim had the kind of madness the project needed to ultimately get made," he says. "And his warmth was a hedge against a movie that could have been on the cold side and needed someone with audience sympathy...
...original script was set in New York City. When Niccol teamed with Weir, they changed the scene to Seahaven (much of the film was shot in Seaside, a Florida resort community), where everyone loves Truman because, well, they're paid to. Says Niccol: "We decided to make him a prisoner in paradise." He toyed with various endings--Truman stumbles into a Truman Burbank memorabilia shop, Truman is reunited with his lost love, Truman decides he loves life on TV--and finally devised the current ending, nicely abrupt and ambiguous. "We felt the viewer could write a better ending...
...among much else, luring writers away from Larry Sanders to create shows for Grey's TV studio. Grey denies the allegations, and Shandling won't comment. Otherwise, he has a part in Hurlyburly, a just wrapped film based on the David Rabe play, and he is developing a movie script about an alien who visits earth, a project that has been in the works for years. So his career seems uncertain. But who cares? Shandling's show was better than 99% of everything that's ever been on TV. That should be enough for us, even...
...Emmerich approached the project gingerly, having rejected four previous overtures from Sony to take charge of Godzilla. The monster appeared to be unmanageable. Jan De Bont (Speed) tried to tame the beast for a while but gave up after Sony balked at the budget he wanted for a script that had Godzilla battling a shape-shifting beast. James Cameron (Titanic), Tim Burton (Batman) and David Fincher (Alien 3) were among the directors at one time considered to update Godzilla. When Steven Spielberg, who knows from dinosaurs, heard that Devlin and Emmerich were contemplating the movie, he tried to talk them...