J.J. Abrams Tried To Make Roger Rabbit 2
J.J. Abrams almost made a ‘Who Framed Roger Rabbit’ sequel.
During an interview with The Nerdist, the director of ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’ revealed how he once repaired a bunch of 8mm films for Steven Spielberg… and how he later approached him about ‘Roger Rabbit 2’.
“I’ve told this story before, but when I was 16 Kathleen Kennedy called Matt Reeves and I, to ask if we would repair these 8mm films Steven had made when he was a kid,” he revealed. “It happened because we were in a film festival and she had read about us in the LA Times. So, of course, we said yes and did the repairs.”
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“Years later I got to meet Steven,” he added. “I went into a meeting… actually, it was for a Roger Rabbit sequel. It was a whole thing.”
But it seems the director had intended to release a ‘Roger Rabbit’ short ahead of any sequel.
“I actually have some storyboards for a Roger Rabbit short,” he explained. “We never really got to that phase [where it got serious]. We were writing an outline, but it honestly went away before it was anything. This was a long time ago. Zemeckis probably would’ve been a producer on it. This was 1989.”
“We were talking about the movie, but they had an idea for this short,” he explained.
And it seems this was his first time working with an animation pitch.
“I remember going to the animators — and I had never seen an animation pitch before — and they took me through it. There were three giant boards, and with a stick, they’d point to one of the storyboards and perform every frame. For someone who knows animation, you think, ‘Yeah, that’s what they do,’ but having never seen it before, it was unbelievably entertaining watching these two men perform, doing the voices.”
Abrams also revealed that after their ‘Roger Rabbit’ meeting, Steven Spielberg revealed that he remembered Abrams restoring his old 8mm films all those years ago… and then, 30 years later, he was called by Kathleen Kennedy once again.
And this time, it was to direct ‘The Force Awakens’.
But will we ever see a ‘Who Framed Roger Rabbit?’ sequel?
There have been various updates over the years – the last back in 2010 when Robert Zemeckis revealed that he still plans on making a follow-up to the 1988 animated film.
“It’s great,” Zemeckis told MTV News about the proposed script.. “Oh, it’s going to be great. I think it’s going to be great.”
But will it ever see the light of day? For now, we’ll have to wait and see.
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Picture Credit: Amblin Entertainment
