Amazon Aims to Air 'Lord of the Rings' Series in 2021

There's still no creative team attached to Amazon's big-budgeted "Lord of the Rings" series, but that hasn't stopped the streaming service from setting a (tentative) release date for the project.

In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Jennifer Salke, the new head of Amazon Studios, gave an update on the project, which was officially greenlit back in November. According to the executive, the goal is to begin production on the series in two years, and have it begin airing on the streaming service sometime in 2021 (though Salke did say that some Amazon staffers are hoping to beat that, and make it 2020 instead).

First, however, a lot of work needs to be done, and that begins with nailing down a story, and a creative team to tell it. According to Salke, Amazon has been meeting with multiple teams of writers who all have different pitches in mind for where to take the Middle Earth-set story. Though she declined to discuss any of those potential plot points (including the rumor that the show will focus on a younger version of Aragorn, played in the film series by Viggo Mortensen), the exec said that Amazon was "very excited" to "move forward ... very soon" with the project.

"There have been a lot of informational meetings about the material and about the scope of what we can do," Salke told THR. "My hope would be to put together a group of talented people, which will obviously have a leader who can embark on this big ambitious endeavor."

As for someone who's already explored the ambitious world of J.R.R. Tolkien, Peter Jackson, Salke said that the Oscar winner's involvement in the series -- which the director himself has denied in the past -- is currently an open-ended question.

"We're in conversations with him that I think are very amicable about how much involvement he wants and what kind," the exec told THR. "We haven't figured out exactly what that is yet. He may say he is involved or he's not involved. We're still very much in conversation with him about what kind of involvement he would propose."

Regardless of whether or not Jackson joins the series, in whatever form that may take, it sounds like Amazon is determined to get it right. Stay tuned to see if it makes Salke's 2021 deadline.

[via: The Hollywood Reporter]