Death comes to us all. When he came to Mort, he offered him a job.
That's the tag-line on the back cover of my copy of the fourth Discworld novel, Mort. And it instantly tells you why this, out of all the books, is the one Hollywood has been chasing for years. There can't be many better one line pitches.
Sadly, all sorts of wacky legal issues and stock Hollywood executive incompetence (of the sort you expect they do on purpose so that frustrated writers have something to talk about, the famous comment in relation to Mort was “Can we lose the Death angle?”) means not only has it not happened, it's unlikely ever to see the light of day. At least not whilst Pratchett is alive and able to object, I suspect once he's passed on it will all go Douglas Adams and we'll have a mediocre film backed up with “No, really, Terry would have loved it” comments from those involved.
That's the tag-line on the back cover of my copy of the fourth Discworld novel, Mort. And it instantly tells you why this, out of all the books, is the one Hollywood has been chasing for years. There can't be many better one line pitches.
Sadly, all sorts of wacky legal issues and stock Hollywood executive incompetence (of the sort you expect they do on purpose so that frustrated writers have something to talk about, the famous comment in relation to Mort was “Can we lose the Death angle?”) means not only has it not happened, it's unlikely ever to see the light of day. At least not whilst Pratchett is alive and able to object, I suspect once he's passed on it will all go Douglas Adams and we'll have a mediocre film backed up with “No, really, Terry would have loved it” comments from those involved.
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