Peter Jackson Says Stephen Colbert Pitched His ‘Lord of the Rings’ Movie Before CBS Canceled ‘The Late Show’ and They’ve Already Spent One Year Working on It

Jackson:

>“He phoned me up a year ago — before he knew his show was going to finish — and said, ‘I don’t know if you’re interested, but I’ve got an idea for a Tolkien movie based on the books that I think would be really good.’”

>Jackson said he liked Colbert’s pitch enough to set him up with his long-standing collaborator Philippa Boyens, who co-wrote “The Lord of the Rings” and “The Hobbit” trilogies, and they worked together for a year on a treatment. Colbert even travelled to New Zealand to be closer to the team.

>“I think Steven’s actually really happy — I think it helped him process [something that] what was rather shocking. So it was like, okay, one day he’s going to be a late night talk show host, and the next day he’s going to be a Tolkien scriptwriter.”

The movie is currently titled ‘The Lord of the Rings: Shadows of the Past’:

>Written by Colbert, his son Peter McGee and Boyens, the film’s official logline reads: “Fourteen years after the passing of Frodo — Sam, Merry and Pippin set out to retrace the first steps of their adventure. Meanwhile, Sam’s daughter, Elanor, has discovered a long-buried secret and is determined to uncover why the War of the Ring was very nearly lost before it even began.”