Feb. production status report: Silence is not golden

It has been almost a month since the last production update and over two months since we have received any updates from Benioff and Weiss via the Westeros forums. I had hoped that by the time the monthly update rolled around again there would be more concrete news to report. Unfortunately that isn’t the case.

The last update they gave us (on Dec. 3rd) they told us they expected to be able to reveal to us a confirmed shooting location and information on a casting director and where to send resumes, audition tapes, etc within a month. It’s been over two months now and we still haven’t heard anything. So what gives?

If you boil it down, there are really only two reasons for the current lack of updates from the producers right now. They are:

1) The pre-production phase is going slower than they anticipated and there is no news to report. The reasons for this could be any number of things. It could be that HBO is having difficulty nailing down a shooting location. It could be that Benioff and Weiss are busy with other projects and attempting to multi-task has caused progress to be slow. There could be some financial hang ups. Maybe they are still awaiting a budget approval? It could be any or all of these things. Obviously there is no way of knowing.

2) Progress is being made and the producers just haven’t updated the fans yet. Could be that a shooting location is set, a casting director in place, budget is approved and they are in the full swing of pre-production. Certainly if the rumor over at AICN is to be believed, there are some casting negotiations going on. Maybe they are too busy to update us regularly? Although checking their profile over at Westeros shows that they have been logged in since Dec. So either David or Dan or, more likely, an assistant is logging in semi-regularly but yet still no updates. Maybe HBO has asked for Benioff and Weiss to keep a tigher lid on the production? With the script leak and now the Dinklage rumor, it is possible that David & Dan are being extra cautious with the information they give out. Or it could be that they want to wait until they have some really big news (read: Dinklage as Tyrion) to report before they give us an update?

Hopefully what is going on is more a case of option no. 2 and not option no. 1. Personally I am leaning more towards the second option. I am really, really hoping that we get an update soon and maybe accompanying it will be the big casting news we are all waiting for? Even if there is no big news, it would be nice to at least hear that the production is moving along and that there haven’t been any hang ups. Heaven knows, ASOIAF fans have already had their fill of delays.

• Published on 02/10/2009 at 12:23 PM CDT
• Last updated on 02/10/2009 at 12:23 PM CDT