80s film favourites The Blues Brothers and Romancing The Stone are destined for the small screen. According to Variety and Deadline respectively, writers have been hired to produce a script for Romancing The Stone t.v. series (more on that below) and a pilot script has already been completed for The Blues Brothers by John Belushis widow, Judy Belushi, former Saturday Night Live writer Anne Beatts along with Wayne Catania and Kieron Lafferty. Star and co-creator of The Blues Brothers, Dan Aykroyd has given the project his full backing, having owned the TV rights for the characters along with Judy Belushi for many years. Beginning life as a skit on Saturday Night Live, The Blues Brothers debuted on US TV in 1978 before spawning a full length feature film in 1980 that was directed by John Landis. Although the film was not a huge commercial success it gained a massive cult following and despite John Belushis death in 1982, Aykroyd continued with the venture investing in the House Of Blues music venues and writing a belated and mis-titled sequel Blues Brothers 2000 in 1998. Talking to Variety, Judy Belushi explains the reasoning behind the move to TV;
"I think these are great American characters. We want to keep them alive. We chose to introduce them as new characters but do it in a way that they have some history, have some life behind them."
Co-writer of the pilot, Anne Beatts adds;
"We're not trying to replicate Dan and John but Jake and Elwood."
Rather worryingly, Beatts describes the pilot as 'Route 66' meets 'Glee' with Jake and Elwood out of jail and looking for Elwoods real father. If the pilot was to go to series, each episode would include a musical number and feature Aykroyd as the voice of the brothers parole officer. No other casting has been suggested at this stage. Real Steel director Shawn Levy has been approached to produce and possibly direct a pilot of Romancing The Stone, due to be written by Mark Friedman, creator of the Christian Slater led TV show The Forgotten which only ran for one season. The original film made in 1984 starred Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner and was written and directed by Robert Zemeckis. A huge hit on release it went on to spawn a lacklustre sequel Jewel Of The Nile which brought all suggestions of a franchise to a close. Originally expected to be developed for a big screen remake, US TV network NBC has given the green light to produce a pilot as soon as the script is ready. Sounding more like a complete re-boot rather than a remake the proposed series would;
Follow a successful but unfulfilled woman who teams with a risk-taking adventurer to take on weekly missions while on a larger quest to find her missing brother.
In my opinion, The Blues Brothers TV show sounds pretty awful especially if its going to be inspired by Glee however the idea of a Romancing The Stone show certainly sounds more promising. Its just a shame Shawn Levy is attached as he is yet to prove himself after the mis-judged Pink Panther remake and the wasted opportunity of last years Date Night. Let us know what you think.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WokoWHHAxp4