However you feel about his works, screenwriter/producer Akiva Goldsman keeps carrying on.
He penned Joel Schumacher’s two John Grisham and two Batman films, won the Oscar for “A Beautiful Mind,” and wrote blockbusters like “I Robot,” “I Am Legend,” “Lost in Space,” “Constantine,” “Angels & Demons,” and “The Da Vinci Code” along with films like “Practical Magic,” “Cinderella Man,” “The 5th Wave,” “The Divergent Series: Insurgent” and “The Dark Tower”.
On TV he was a key player on J.J. Abrams’ “Fringe” and currently steers “Star Trek: Strange New Worlds” which is about to premiere its third season next week. Marking the occasion, he gave a lengthy interview with THR where a number of topics came up.
First up, asked about the “Constantine” and “I Am Legend” sequels, he was asked which was more likely to move forward first. He says: “For different reasons, I think ‘I Am Legend’ [script] is more finished, and I think ‘Constantine’ is more likely.”
While 2017’s failed “The Dark Tower” film was considered a major bomb, Goldsman was part of the now scuttled plans for a large-scale take on the Stephen King fantasy series that would’ve spanned multiple films and TV series. Asked what happened there, he says:
“We didn’t live up to that opportunity. The original plan that Ron [Howard] and I had was really ambitious and really extraordinary, and there was a version of the first movie that was at Universal that we ultimately weren’t able to make that I think would’ve been something. There are books upon books upon books, binders about the movie. We worked on that universe for such a long time — for naught.”
Mike Flanagan has now taken over the planned adaptation of the work at Amazon Prime Video. Goldsman was also asked about the recent failed attempt to screen the director’s cut of “Batman Forever” publicly – an attempt Warner Brothers shut down. Asked if the film will ever get released, he says:
“After Joel died [in 2020], I reached out to Warners and said, ‘There’s a darker version of this movie.’ We found it. It exists and it’s incomplete, but more complete than you would think.
Today there would be giant sections where the VFX wasn’t done. In those days, so much of it was miniatures and practical effects — they were done. We were trying to dust it off, and then everybody stopped caring. But I lobby for it.
Bruce is having these recurring visions of a red book, which turns out to be his father’s diary. There’s an entry that says, ‘Martha and I want to stay home tonight. Bruce wants to see a movie, so we’re going to take him out.’ So he holds himself responsible [for their deaths].
There’s a section in the movie where he actually is hit in the head. He doesn’t remember that he’s Batman, and he goes back into the cave. There’s this now rather famous Rick Baker bat that he faces.
Goldsman recently did the script for the “Practical Magic” sequel and is continuing work on “Strange New Worlds,” which is in the midst of production of its fourth season through late August. It’ll take a break, and then a shortened six-episode fifth and final season goes into production.
