I thought Stephen Donaldsons Mordants Need duology could make a good movie or high budget limited series. The heroine has a bit of an issue as I could see people thinking ’ jeez just do something already would ya’ , but to be fair she is not actually certain if she really existed before or was created by magic, and the ending I think was pretty kick ass ( i did read it a long time ago so I may be rembering things with some rose tinted spectacles). Bernard Hill could reuse his ’ old Theoden’ make up and costume as King Joyse.
All my sins remebered by Haldeman, an excellent mini series to be made. Each episode of our hero bringing peace and equality in the different worlds , a james bond quantum leap sort of thing. For sure he is a little rough, but the ends and the means and all that, and the outcome was for the best. Clearly by the end our hero is getting a little frazzled but he starts to see through the mysterious forces and an ending I still remember being shocked at, where he brings it all down in a surprising twist. Well something like that
One series and done and move on. Plenty of opportunity to use it as a showcase for new actors and directors for each of the episodes as there would be very few repeat characters other than the main, even then maybe not, a bit like some of the anthology series that have been making the rounds.
Of course you could do Gravity’s Rainbow. Start in London in World War Two ( or not) then just do whatever you want to do, who is going to argue ?
Yeah another ‘tried and failed’ person here, it is on the shelf behind me, I’d say it was smirking at me, but i dont think that book cares about anything , it has probably rewritten itself as a study of Sumarian Generally Accepted Accounting Practices since I last opened it.
But Mira’s Last Dance ends on something of a cliffhanger. You’d want to include Prisoners of Limnos, just to resolve that.
Agreed, though, that you’d need some sort of exposition first, to explain the Five Gods and the nature of demons. Although the latter could be done via Desdemona teaching Penric, as in the novella. You’d also need an actor talented enough to show when he’s Penric and when he’s Desdemona, talking through Penric. Tatiana Maslany could do it, but she’s the wrong gender for Pen. (Although given how Penric is described as pretty, she might could play him…)
You’re not wrong. But that’s why I suggested Tatiana Maslany. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen Orphan Black, but she plays multiple roles, as clones of a single woman. I heard a scene where she played a clone, a second clone, and then the first impersonating the second; and she was able to portray the subtle difference between the second woman and the first pretending to be her. In other words, she’s a skilled enough actor to play Pen and Des-speaking-in-Pen’s-voice, without any editing tricks needed.
Tatiana Maslany was amazing in Orphan Black. She totally convinced me all those characters were played by different actors.
Since it seems the only books being discussed here are scifi/fantasy, I’d love to see Seanane McGuire’s October Daye series done as either a mini-series or film series. If she ever wraps it all up.
You’ll need a lead actress who’s capable of being very expressive without actually expressing much, someone draws everyone’s attention while trying to fade into the woodwork. Anya Taylor-Joy would be perfect, IMHO.
“Anya was born in Miami, the youngest of six children. Her father is Scottish who was born in South America, and her mother is Spanish-English who was born in Zambia in Africa, to an English diplomat father and a Spanish mother from Barcelona”
I think that sort of thing is now very common. I have a grandniece and a grandnephew who were born in California. They are half Ashkenazi-Jewish, one quarter Chinese, one eighth German, three thirty-seconds English, and one thirty-seconds Swiss. The daughter of a couple I know was born in Maryland. She has ancestors who come from ten countries of Europe and from the Philippines, as well as some who are Native Americans.
You know, back a few months ago there were articles about This Is Us that pointed out that the child who played baby Jack in the final season is albino…and other than us having freckles, he’s not actually any fairer than my brother and me. So, if you had the sort of redheads whose freckles fade just about completely away during the winter months like mine and his (but not our late mother’s, oddly) and kept them out of sunlight long enough to do that, and gave them contacts if necessary you’d be good to go.
But that’s why I suggested Tatiana Maslany. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen Orphan Black, but she plays multiple roles, as clones of a single woman. I heard a scene where she played a clone, a second clone, and then the first impersonating the second; and she was able to portray the subtle difference between the second woman and the first pretending to be her. In other words, she’s a skilled enough actor to play Pen and Des-speaking-in-Pen’s-voice, without any editing tricks needed.