With director Chris Columbus' Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief opening this Friday, I was able to talk with screenwriter Craig Titley (Scooby-Doo, Cheaper by the Dozen) about his involvement in the project yesterday afternoon. During the interview, we talked about writing Percy Jackson, his involvement in Star Wars: The Clone Wars cartoon (he's written two episodes), and what's up with 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. And just to clarify the 20,000 Leagues story, two competing projects were going at the same time last year, one was at Disney with McG helming, and one was being developed at New Line with Sam Raimi's company. Titley wrote the New Line one. During the interview he talks about his take on the material and what it's about.
Watch the interview after the jump:
And one final thing before the interview...I need to come clean. Craig Titley and I have been friends for a number of years, so it's more of a conversation between friends than a hard hitting interview.
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Craig Titley
- Star Wars Clone Wars talk - talks about the two episodes he wrote, going to Lucas Ranch, meeting George Lucas, and how he's a Star Wars nerd
- 5:00 - Percy Jackson talk - How did he get involved in the movie
- 6:10 - How close is the movie to the books
- 7:15 - Did he have fun writing the Gods and what kind of research did he do
- 8:15 - When he was writing the script did he know the caliber of actors that were going to get cast
- 9:30 - Craig explains how Chris Columbus scripts taught him to write
- 11:15 - Has he seen the final cut of Percy Jackson and what was cut
- 12:15 - 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea talk - He did the one with Sam Raimi's company that was set up at New Line (not the Disney one)
- 13:20 - What's his take on 20,000 Leagues
- 15:30 - Did he write 20,000 Leagues with any sort of budget in mind
- 16:15 - What is he working on right now
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