QUINT: I saw in Variety that THE HOBBIT came up. The MGM thing. Did you see this?
PETER JACKSON: Where the guy who runs MGM was announcing their tentpoles and saying they were doing TERMINATOR 4 and they want me to make 2 HOBBIT films? I was reading that this morning on the net. It's a rather strange thing to wake to. I'm up for it, but somebody should phone me because I'm getting a bit booked out at the moment!
Everybody asks me about THE HOBBIT, you know? But the reality is I've never had a conversation with anybody about it. Not one person has ever made a phone call to me. I don't know. The irony is that we're acquiring our own projects now and we're buying the rights to books. The reality is, to be quite honest with you, we're getting ourselves now nice and busy, in a good way, for the next 4 years. So, people have not (spoken to us) about THE HOBBIT and it's making it more and more impossible for us to be involved.
QUINT: So, if you got a phone call tomorrow telling you that you could have any budget you need and creative freedom, but it has to be finished and in theaters by December 2009. Would you find room for THE HOBBIT?
PETER JACKSON: Well, it depends. No one has phoned me, which is kind of weird, but I don't know. We're very, very excited and committed about the films that we're working on now, so I don't know. I'd have to sit down and look at it all. Obviously, I'm interested in THE HOBBIT, but right now we have no emotional investment in it. For the last few years, we have put our hearts into other projects. It would seem strange to have somebody else do it, although some part of me would be interested in going to see somebody else's HOBBIT, be able to buy my popcorn and go and sit and watch the film.
I'm not against that and if our schedule is impossible, then that's what they'll do. They'll certainly go and get someone else to make it. They won't wait, which is their right.
I like it! Clever!
