Steven Moffat Writes Tintin
Dr. Who Scribe Takes on 3 Movies for Steven Spielberg, Peter Jackson
Hugo Award-winning writer Steven Moffat (Dr. Who) has been tapped by Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson to write the script for Tintin trilogy. First movie due in 2009
British writer Steven Moffat has been asked to write the scripts for Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson's trilogy of Tintin.
According to the Hollywood Reporter, Spielberg and Jackson approached the Hugo Award-winning scrivener (Dr. Who, Jekyll) to pen the scripts for the CGI trilogy based on Hergé's iconic Belgian reporter.
Spielberg to Direct First TinTin Movie for DreamWorks
Spielberg will direct the first Tintin movie for DreamWorks Animation, while Peter Jackson will helm the second. The director for the third movie has not as yet been announced. Spielberg's long-time production partner Kathleen Kennedy will produce the films, alongside Spielberg and Jackson.
Unusually, WETA (Jackson's special effects company) will design the animation for the movies, instead of DreamWorks Animation's in-house crew. This makes sense, since Tintin will be animated using motion-capture, not straight CGI. This was the method WETA used when animating the character of Gollum for the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
Steven Moffat is best known for his work on Dr. Who, the science-fiction serial for Britain's BBC One. He leaped to the first rank of Dr. Who writers when he wrote the dramatic two-parter "The Empty Child"/"The Doctor Dances." It won the 2006 Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form, and helped revive the long-running science-fiction serial, which has been airing in one form or another on the BBC since 1963.
Moffat is a Hugo Winner for Dr. Who Scripts
Moffat contributed "The Girl in the Fireplace" for the 2006 Dr. Who season, which promptly won a second Hugo in the same category, and received a Nebula nomination as well. He then wrote "Blink" for the 2007 season, which makes him the only writer (other than showrunner Russell T. Davies) to contribute scripts for all 4 recent Dr. Who seasons.
There have been rumours that Moffat may be tapped to become Dr. Who's showrunner (or executive producer) once Davies steps down, a rumour which Moffat refuses to comment on.
Tintin, the comic created by Hergé (real name Georges Remi), is one of the most popular comic serials in the world, with over 200 million copies sold, and translated into 50 languages. The comic follows the adventures of the titular Belgian reporter, his dog Milou (not Snowy, dammit!) and his sidekick, the bumbling Captain Haddock.
Fun Fact: Hergé wrote Tintin from 1929 to his death in 1983. During the Second World War, Hergé continued to crank out Tintin adventures for Le Soir, the Brussels newspaper that had been co-opted into a Nazi mouthpiece during the German occupation of Belgium.
After the war, Hergé found himself arrested four times and accused of being a Nazi collaborator. It was only after publisher and famed Resistance fighter Raymond Leblanc gave Hergé his backing that he was able to resume Tintin's adventures in serial form.
