Speaking exclusively to CultBox earlier this week, composer Jeff Wayne said it was his “dream” to get his version of The War of the Worlds on the big screen. And, from what he told us, it looks likely to happen in the next few years.

‘Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version of The War of the Worlds’ has sold millions of copies around the world and the 1978 double album spawned a live show some years ago with a new version, and album, coming very soon. OSCAR-nominated actor Liam Neeson is the star, albeit holographically, of the new stage show whilst the new album features the likes of Gary Barlow and Joss Stone.

When we asked him about his plans for a movie, first mooted by Wayne in the early Noughties, the composer told us: “An animated film, that’s right. Our tours wouldn’t have happened had I not already been working with a whole team of animators and I didn’t have any real understanding whether War of the Worlds would have a life after that [the first tour in 2005]. So my plan was to return with the animators to carry on working on the animated feature film.”

He continued: “The animations kept being developed although it’s being used in our tours. It’s on a hundred food wide screen and the quality is fantastic. We have almost two hours of high-definition animation. And I do hope, it’s my dream, another one of my boxes to tick as an all-time dream, is to have an animated feature film which I hope, after this tour, there will be space to return to. I’ll have a bit of next year to work on the feature film – we’ll see.”

We asked about the possible copyright issues regarding a new War of the Worlds film (Steven Spielberg’s motion picture was released in 2005) and Jeff explained that he had originally bought “all the rights” to the War of the Worlds in the 1970s with the exception of the original book publication and the feature film rights.

When Spielberg and Paramount came to their version, they had to approach Wayne as they did not own “soundtrack rights, merchandising, theme park, whatever!” An “amicable arrangement” was made and Jeff Wayne got the “right to do an animated feature film and TV series,” which fuelled Wayne into seeking animators for the project. Happily, the composer states that his production can do “anything we want around the War of the Worlds.”

Our full interview with Jeff Wayne will be published later this month.

‘The War of the Worlds: The New Generation’ is released on Monday 26 November.

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