Has anyone seen...

[Fireball07]

that script for the pilot that was supposed to be leaked? I'm sure somebody here must have heard of it. Is it reliable? I'm not really sure what the think, and I haven't seen a topic about it.

[Paxter]

[quote name='Fireball07' post='1639885' date='Jan 7 2009, 06.53']that script for the pilot that was supposed to be leaked? I'm sure somebody here must have heard of it. Is it reliable? I'm not really sure what the think, and I haven't seen a topic about it.[/quote]

The only person I know who has had access to the script is "Mr Winter is Coming" who posts on a blog that was endorsed by GRRM on Not a Blog. This endorsement by GRRM probably increases the probability that this leak is reliable and not a fake. His discussion of the leaked script can be found [url="http://winter-is-coming.blogspot.com/2008/12/winter-is-comings-exclusive-pilot.html"]here.[/url] There is also a review by Brude (who is a mod on this board) on the blog [url="http://winter-is-coming.blogspot.com/2008/12/professionals-opinion-on-script.html"]here.[/url]

As far as I know, "Mr Winter is Coming" and Brude are the only two who have Boarders who have read the script.

[Parris]

[quote name='Paxter' post='1640036' date='Jan 6 2009, 17.19']The only person I know who has had access to the script is "Mr Winter is Coming" who posts on a blog that was endorsed by GRRM on Not a Blog. This endorsement by GRRM probably increases the probability that this leak is reliable and not a fake. His discussion of the leaked script can be found[/quote]

Ummm, just want to make clear that even though George may have mentioned the new blog about the series, such a mention was a courtesy. It does NOT mean he gave anyone a copy of the pilot script - heck, I haven't gotten to see the pilot script yet - nor does it mean that any one who claims to have seen the pilot script has actually seen the script and has spread information about the alleged script with George's blessing. I think I can say with some confidence that George would prefer that AGoT on HBO be unveiled with great fanfare, with few leaks from the production that B&W control, not GRRM.

Yes, George will get a Exective producer credit, yes, he will write one script per season, but he will not be involved in day to day producer duties.

Please don't assume you know what George thinks or what he is going to do next with ADwD, the series or anything else concerning his work, you can't and don't.

[Paxter]

[quote name='Parris' post='1640310' date='Jan 7 2009, 16.49']Ummm, just want to make clear that even though George may have mentioned the new blog about the series, such a mention was a courtesy. It does NOT mean he gave anyone a copy of the pilot script - heck, I haven't gotten to see the pilot script yet - nor does it mean that any one who claims to have seen the pilot script has actually seen the script and has spread information about the alleged script with George's blessing.[/quote]

It seems then, that I was incorrect in assuming that GRRM's allusion to the Winter is Coming Blogspot was an endorsement. I apologise for jumping to conclusions.

[Fireball07]

I think the Winter is Coming one is the one I heard about. But someone told me that the script had been leaked all over the internet.

That is definitely not true then. And there is a possibilty that a few people have seen it, and that review is at least semi-reliable?

[Brude]

I won't get into details of the where, the how or the who of my source on the script. Suffice it to say, it was not directly from someone at HBO but I am fairly confident that it is the real thing, though I do not know the date of the draft or if there have been any significant changes since this one. The version I have did not have a cover, so this information is completely unknown to me - no date, no indication of what draft it is. It is quite possible that there have been some rewrites since the version that I reviewed.

I do not know if the script has been leaked to the internet, I haven't seen it but I also haven't looked for it - that wasn't how I got it. I have come across some comments here and there that suggest some others have maybe read it as well, so it may be out there. In the business it was never too hard to get scripts of purchased properties that I wanted to read. Scripts get traded around a lot, either as samples of a writer's work by those considering hiring them, or just because people want and need to see what is going on at other companies. There was one case I remember where a producer offered another manager I worked with $350,000 for a script she hadn't even sent out yet. We never did learn how he got a copy of the thing, but what did we care, we accepted the offer because you seldom if ever got an offer like that for a first time writer. There are times that a company would keep enough secrecy about a project that it was hard if not impossible to get. I honestly don't know if the pilot is floating around the industry or not but if it is, it probably wont' be long before it is posted somewhere (if it hasn't been already).

[Parris]

[quote name='Paxter' post='1640338' date='Jan 7 2009, 02.03']It seems then, that I was incorrect in assuming that GRRM's allusion to the Winter is Coming Blogspot was an endorsement. I apologise for jumping to conclusions.[/quote]

thanks, just wanted to make it clear to folks that GRRM doesn't have any real control over what happens with the series beyond what input he can give B&W and the one script per season he will write. He doesn't condone piracy of any type, and distributing an alleged pilot script on the net comes pretty close.

early drafts of scripts can be very different than the completed shooting script. I used to come by the B&B offices sometimes, and there would always be a PA running the copier to replace pages of the script that had been re-written. (There's also a complex color system for rewrite pages I never could comprehend) A good reader of scripts might be able to see a script suxs in a few pages, but might not be able to see that one good script because of their own inherent biases, and even if they do, as others have mentioned, may not want to 'go to the mat' for a script because of the dangers to their own job if the studio gambles millions on a script and production and the film fails.

If anyone does come across some alleged pilot script on-line, I would caution them in passing it along, let alone believe that it really is the B&W written pilot script that they are currently working on producing. It might be an early draft, plucked from the recycling bin at a studio, or an agent's office by an eager industry minion who loves the books, it might be a complete hoax, written by someone who loves to watch people's heads explode and the ensuing internet hoo-rah.

[Parris]

[quote name='Brude' post='1640762' date='Jan 7 2009, 12.26']I won't get into details of the where, the how or the who of my source on the script. Suffice it to say, it was not directly from someone at HBO but I am fairly confident that it is the real thing, though I do not know the date of the draft or if there have been any significant changes since this one. The version I have did not have a cover, so this information is completely unknown to me - no date, no indication of what draft it is. It is quite possible that there have been some rewrites since the version that I reviewed.[/quote]


No date? no notation on which draft version the script may be? No credits on any of the script pages? Really? gee, manuscript production standards must have really gone downhill since George and Melinda worked out there, because most of what I just mentioned were SOP for scripts back then, and was part of the formatting offered by software designed to be used by script writers.

[Brude]

[quote name='Parris' post='1641081' date='Jan 7 2009, 19.48']No date? no notation on which draft version the script may be? No credits on any of the script pages? Really? gee, manuscript production standards must have really gone downhill since George and Melinda worked out there, because most of what I just mentioned were SOP for scripts back then, and was part of the formatting offered by software designed to be used by script writers.[/quote]
It's a good point and suggests either it's a very early draft or comes from a draft sent in by the writers before they gave it to someone with a bit more technical expertise who might run it through Final Draft (or whatever) and add all of the proper page headers. Most of the clients I rep'd. couldn't be bothered to add these things to the scripts they turned in. Even some writers we had that spent a lot of time in TV and were well established for feature rewrite work didn't do this sort of thing and had some assistant or PA do it for them. A lot of them were working with only the most basic screenwriting word processing templates for Word or whatever and didn't even bother with screenwriting software.

Assuming the script I read is genuine, I do not think (and never thought) it was from a production script - it felt like an early draft and had a few minor errors that smelled of something the writers had just turned in, perhaps even under some time pressure (for instance, one of the Stark children had two different ages listed at different points in the script, I forget if it was Jon or Robb) - nothing unusual in my experience, but something like that would probably be clarified in later drafts.

If it is a fake, it's a well written fake by someone who should not be wasting their time and effort writing spec pilots for properties they don't even have the rights to. They should be writing spec episodes of Lost or Mad Men and trying to get some real work out there, they might have a chance.