Grappling between the not-so-contending ending of “Game of Thrones” and highly anticipating its prequel House of Dragons’s new season, fans get fresh news as Iconic “A Song of Ice and Fire “creator George R R Martin unveils the first-look still photo from the set of his upcoming sci-fi project. The American novelist and screenwriter is currently working on a project titled “The Summer Machine.” It’s a short film that will be part of a new anthology series.
What do we know about this short film?
According to Deadline, the filming of “The Summer Machine” recently wrapped at an undisclosed location in New Mexico. The film is made under the direction of Michael Cassutt, who also serves as the writer of the film. He is known for producing or writing, or both, for “The Outer Limits, Eerie, Indiana, Beverly Hills, 90210, and The Twilight Zone. Apart from his work on television, Cassutt has written over thirty short stories, predominately in the genres of science fiction and fantasy.
Cassutt is also the producer of the film, along with Steve Graham, Elias Gallegos, and Mark Steinig, alongside Martin for Fevre River Packet Company.
Lensed by Alexander Yellen, the film stars Lina Esco (S.W.A.T.) and features Charles Martin Smith (American Graffiti) and Matt Frewer (Fear the Walking Dead) in supporting roles.
In a statement on the project, Martin playfully nodded to his famous Game of Thrones catchphrase ‘Winter is Coming’, as he quipped, ‘Summer is Coming’.
George R.R. Martin Questions the Authenticity of Adapted Works
George R.R. Martin is best known for authoring the series of epic fantasy novels “A Song of Ice and Fire,” which HBO adapted into the Emmy Award-winning series “Game of Thrones” and its prequel series “House of the Dragon.” Other Game of Thrones projects Martin has in the works include 10,000 Ships, 9 Voyages, and A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms: The Hedge Knight.
While it’s undeniable that GOT creators did their best to do justice to Martin’s original novel, the novelist believes that most current film and TV adaptations fail to match the quality of their source material. Martin shared on his blog,
“Everywhere you look, there are more screenwriters and producers eager to take great stories and ‘make them their own. It does not seem to matter whether the source material was written by Stan Lee, Charles Dickens, Ian Fleming, Roald Dahl, Ursula K. Le Guin, J.R.R. Tolkien, Mark Twain, Raymond Chandler, Jane Austen, or… well, anyone.”
Martin continued,
“No matter how major a writer it is, no matter how great the book, there always seems to be someone on hand who thinks he can do better, eager to take the story and ‘improve’ on it. ‘The book is the book, the film is the film,’ they will tell you as if they were saying something profound. Then they make the story their own.”
However, Martin counts one adaptation as exceptional: the “Shogun” series, based on the 1975 novel by James Clavell.
As for Martin’s upcoming short film, “The Summer Machine,” it has yet to schedule a release date.
