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David Jason has signed up to play a failed wizard in an adaptation of Terry Pratchett's The Colour of Magic on Sky One.
The move follows his success in Pratchett's Hogfather, which aired on Sky One earlier this year and saw Jason play Death's servant Albert.
In The Colour of Magic, he will play the lead character Rincewind.
Speaking to The Stage at the Bafta Craft Awards, Jason said: "We will start to shoot it in the summer and I think it will come out sometime next year.
"It will have a lot of visual effects and I am looking forward to playing the lead character. Sky One was delighted with Hogfather, but I think The Colour of Magic is actually a better story."
Jason did not say who else was lined up to feature in the adaptation, but hinted that a big American actor could be selected to play alongside him in an attempt to increase its appeal internationally.
He said he would like to see all of Pratchett's books in the Discworld series adapted, but added: "We will have to wait and see - at the end of the day we have got to be able to put bums on settees."
www.thestage.co.uk
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When we were planning the movie of Hogfather we met a lot of
Discworld fans and admired their enthusiasm for costuming. That led
to us inviting fans to join the extras in some of the scenes of that
movie.
Boy, was that a high speed learning process. We had not realised
that the history of fan involvement with movies was so chequered.
Since then we have learned more about fandom. We went along to the
Discworld Convention and had a great time. We made certain that fans
got more than half the tickets for the Hogfather premiere. And now,
with the Colour of Magic / Light Fantastic movie in production we
are going to extend the offer of (minor) participation again - and
this time you know who we are. Many of you have already met us.
On August 1st and 2nd the magic of the movies will be strained to
its utmost to turn part of Guildford into Ankh-Morpork (no jokes,
please). We need Ankh-Morpork citizens. We would very much like to
have citizens on both days to a maximum of 50 people. Ideally we
would like the same faces on both days, because that helps with the
continuity of the filming. We can accommodate some one day only
visitors, but two days is really what we are looking for.
Regrettably, we don't need wizards. We have nothing against
wizards. We like wizards. However, since the crowd will be
demonstrating against the wizards of Unseen University, having
wizards taking part in the demonstration as well would be silly.
Apart from that, anyone who could be legitimately part of of an
Ankh-Morpork crowd would be acceptable. We know there are some
wonderful Discworld costumes out there and we can help out somewhat
from the wardrobe department on the day, perhaps in order to enforce
the fact that Discworld as yet does not have trainers or lurex or
much in the way of bright colours. You will find styles from late
Tudor to early Victorian to generic Fantasy, but you won't find much
glitter. And remember: most citizens in Ankh-Morpork probably think
soap is bad for you.
This is not a way of doing without extras. We will have lots of
extras. God help us, we have reason to believe that fans would
actually enjoy taking part.
The fine detail: We could accommodate around 50 of you. We will pay
you 25 a day towards your expenses, we will feed you, you will get
priority tickets to the premiere, a very limited edition cast and
crew T-shirt and an Ankh-Morpork Access All Areas laminated pass.
We will also give an additional award for the best costume.
To get the ball rolling, e-mail a photo of yourself in costume to
This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it as soon as possible, remembering to
include your name and contact details. We understand that you will
have to make plans and so we will get back to you as soon as we can.
Further news and information will be posted on
http://www.pjsmprints.com/news
The Mob Film Company