Chewie was one of the instantly notable scripts on the 2011 Black List of Hollywood’s best unproduced screenplays, because it’s about Star Wars.  The spec script by Evan Susser and Van Robichaux is described as “satirical behind the scenes look at the making of Star Wars through the eyes of Peter Mayhew,” the 7’3″ actor who maintained his job as a hospital worker while he played Chewbacca.

Mayhew recently tweeted, “Yes, we’re working with Kyle Newman and the team on CHEWIE, The Movie and are hopeful it can move forward.”  Heat Vision followed up with a report Newman, the director of the Star Wars love letter Fanboys, acquired Mayhew’s life rights to further develop the script.  There is no specific mention of Newman directing, but his involvement should help move the project along regardless.  George Lucas gave an early approval to Fanboys, enough to lend the movie the official Star Wars sound effects.  Chewie has a terribly appealing premise, but one that is probably dependent on Lucasfilm’s involvement for proper execution.  The project can only benefit from having pre-approved folks like Newman and Mayhew in its corner.  Hit the jump for more on Mayhew.

The live-action feature film adaptation of The Jetsons has been lingering in development for over a decade now, and a couple of writers have just been tapped to perform a new rewrite. Variety reports that Van Robichaux and Evan Susser are now set to pen a new draft of the script. The writing duo are behind the Star Wars-themed Black List script Chewie. Last summer, producer Denise Di Novi talked about why The Jetsons feature has been so tough to crack:

“Part of it is that every couple of years, the genre kind of changes.  I really credit Jeff Robinov at Warner Bros. with this. In choosing Christopher Nolan to do Batman, he really exploded the expectations on adapting all these kinds of titles.  The pressure is on to really make them the coolest movies, and not the cornball cartoon movies. Every couple years it’s changed what they thought the movie should be and I’m hoping now we’re hitting it at the right time. I’ve never given up on that movie.”

Robert Rodriguez was previously attached to direct, but he’s no longer involved. I’m incredibly excited about the prospect of a live-action Jetsons feature, but I also understand that it’s a super hard tone to nail down. Hopefully Robinchaux and Susser have a strong vision for the pic.