More to come...
From ifmagazine
Exclusive Interview: PRODUCER JOHN HARRISON TALKS TO iF ABOUT ROMERO'S DIARY OF THE DEAD -- PART 1
John Harrison is man of many talents and his career shows it. His early work was on zombie movies with George A. Romero as both an assistant director and composer. Then more recently there are the critically acclaimed DUNE and CHILDREN OF DUNE mini-series that Harrison wrote, produced and directed for SCI FI Channel. Now Harrison is going back where it pretty much all started. His newest project is the much-anticipated new Romero zombie flick, DIARY OF THE DEAD. iF MAGAZINE is one of the first to talk to Harrison about what we can all expect from the new Romero social commentary horror flick.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
iF MAGAZINE: Your next project is a new zombie film with George A. Romero, correct?
JOHN HARRISON: We’re going to start a film in October; actually we’re staring pre-production over Labor Day for a new zombie film from George [Romero] called DIARY OF THE DEAD. It’s a terrific new script that George has written, and I will be producing. We worked together on developing this with his partner Peter Gruenwald. Over the past couple of years, we’ve been trying to come up with an idea that a television approach might be kind of cool, but some people have come along and want to finance a theatrical movie so that’s what we’re doing.
iF: The blurb in Variety said it’s people making a zombie movie, but while they are filming real zombies attack them?
HARRISON: That’s right. It’s about a bunch of students who are making their senior project. To some extent it’s George revisiting the origins of the Zombie mythology. This is NOT a sequel to any of the other DEAD movies. He’s essentially going back to first principles if you will. It’s about a group of college students making this movie, and suddenly they are attacked, the world starts to crumble around them, and as they are trying desperately to get to their homes together, they continue to have these horrific experiences. They continue to document everything that happens to them as they go, and thus, THE DIARY OF THE DEAD. It’s a very good script. As someone who has been involved with George for years, the script is just fantastic. It’s got all of his humor and all of his social commentary and obviously some really great scares.
iF: So he’s probably returning to his roots, instead of doing another big studio picture like he did with LAND OF THE DEAD?
HARRISON: No doubt. It’s not autobiographical, I would hesitate to say that, but I would say that it is very much in a sense, you could stretch it and say that the kids in the woods making a movie is very much a metaphor for what it was like when he was in the ‘Burg. It’s similar to when George [John] Russo, [Bill] Heinzman, and all those guys got together and made the first NIGHT. He definitely wants that energy and that style and that camaraderie and the way of doing it going back to the independent way of doing a movie.
iF: I know you were involved with the first two CREEPSHOW films as well as the DEAD movies with George. Do you have any involvement in the new re-makes of some of those films or CREEPSHOW 3?
HARRISON: I haven’t been involved in any of the subsequent sequels to any of the DEAD movies. They’re doing a remake of DAY OF THE DEAD, and they have a couple of other DAY OF THE DEAD subtitled films, none of us have been involved with those movies. A company called United Film Distribution (UFD) owned the rights to those movies and when that company went out of business they sold the rights to another company owned by the Dudelson Brothers and those are the guys who have been re-inventing these movies. We haven’t been involved in any of them.
iF: You are also working on a project with Clive Barker currently?
HARRISON: Last year I did an adaptation for Disney of Clive’s “Abarat” novels. We took the first two books and created an epic screenplay story that was going to be live action and animation out of the Disney feature animation division, but that division closed down when Pixar came back into the picture. So that’s not happening, but in the meantime, Clive starting putting together a package of financing to do movies based on his “Books of Blood.” We had become friends through the “Abarat” process and he liked my DUNE mini-series a whole lot, so we started talking about why did I do one of these. So I have taken the first and the last short stories of the books of blood collection and I’ve turned them into one movie called CLIVE BARKER’S BOOKS OF BLOOD. The screenplay is finished, we’re putting the financing together, and I’m hopeful that we’ll be in production after I finish George’s movie.
iF: Clive in the past has expressed a desire to not direct again, so where does he fit into the BOOKS OF BLOOD project?
HARRISON: He’d be one of the producers, of course. He has been reading every step of the way the drafts of the script that I co-wrote with another young writer named Darren Silverman. He’s very excited about it, and he will be involved creatively. Even though I will be directing, he’ll be the go to guy.
iF: Along the lines of horror, but on a slightly different track, have you heard anything about a DVD release of NIGHTMARE CAFÉ?
HARRISON: I have not. Wow. That would be great! Last year they put out a whole DVD collection of the EARTH 2 season that I was involved in, it was really great. That would be fun.
|
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks