Part 3: The Wizards

December 10, 2002 – 3:45 PM

Wizards of the Coast Headquarters – Renton, WA

The rain was a cold, relentless drizzle. Mark Sterling stood in the lobby, shaking out a wet umbrella. He’d had a frantic race home to grab some clothes in a duffel bag to make the 11:00 flight to Seattle. He’d slept in snatches, but his head still swam from that second gin and tonic on the plane; he wasn’t used to first-class seating. He’d gotten most of it out of his system on the cab ride over, thankfully, but he needed the liquid courage. He checked his Blackberry once more for any last-second notes from New Line. Contrary to Emmerich’s instructions, he wasn’t wearing a $1,000 power suit. Instead, his instincts had told him to wear a corduroy blazer over a faded “Gen Con ‘94” t-shirt he’d dug out of the bottom of his dresser. He looked less like a Hollywood executive and more like a guy who had spent too much money on lead miniatures.

When he was ushered into the “War Room,” he didn’t find a board of directors. He found three guys in fleece vests sitting around a table with a dragon model and a mismatched set of coffee cups. They politely stood up and shook his hand in order, introducing themselves as Bill Slavicsek, Vice-President of D&D, Christopher Perkins, the creative director, and Andy Collins, the lead designer for the Dungeons & Dragons brand. Mark’s mouth went even more dry. The current heavyweight champions of the RPG industry, and Mark was face-to-face with them alone.

“New Line, huh?” said Slavicsek, looking at Mark’s business card with deep suspicion. “We’ve seen your boss on the news. He’s got the Ring. Why does he want our ‘scraps’?”

Mark didn’t sit down. He walked to the window, looking out at the gray Seattle sky. “I’m not here because of the Ring. I’m here because I was ten years old when I read Dragons of Autumn Twilight for the first time. I’m here because I know that Sturm Brightblade’s mustache is more than a design choice—it’s a symbol of a dying code. And I’m here because if New Line doesn’t do this, some hack at another studio will eventually turn Tasslehoff Burrfoot into a Jar-Jar Binks clone.”

The room went quiet. The executives traded looks. This wasn’t the pitch they’d heard from the 2000 movie team.

“You’re talking about Dragonlance,” blurted Collins. “Are you serious?”

Slavicsek looked at Mark with a pitying sort of amusement. “Look, Mark,” Slavicsek said, his voice dropping into a conciliatory tone. “We appreciate the corduroy. We really do. But you’re pitching a dead brand. Dragonlance is…it’s a legacy brand. We literally just gave the keys to Margaret and Sovereign Press. If New Line wants a ‘Greek Tragedy,’ they want the Forgotten Realms. We have Drizzt. We have a dozen Salvatore books on the shelf right now that sell five times what the old Chronicles do.”

Mark nodded. “Sure. But the War of Souls trilogy just spent the past three years climbing into the New York Times bestseller lists. Just like Legends did back in the 80s. Gamers want the Realms, but everyone else? They want the Lance.”

Mark met their gazes head-on. Not as a movie studio ‘executive assistant to the VP’, but as one of them: A gamer. “You didn’t give Margaret the rights back because Dragonlance is dead; the latest trilogy proves it’s not. You gave her those rights because you don’t want a story with an ending. You want a sandbox to play in. That’s fine, but this isn’t about playing. This is about a monument. New Line Cinema wants to take the next step in the fantasy movie genre. And what better way to do that than with a homegrown setting that gamers have been talking about since the first teasers in Dragon magazine all those years ago? A setting with not only dragons, but ancient towers of High Sorcery, magic guided by the three moons, the fabled but feeble Knights of Solamnia. A setting dripping with a post-apocalyptic feel in a world that practically ended three centuries earlier.”

“You know the lore,” muttered Perkins, leaning forward. “But—”

Slavicsek interrupted him. “Mark, Drizzt is the rock star. Salvatore sells out every time he does a signing tour. Tanis is a guy who’s been out of print for nearly a decade, and nobody cares about him. Why should Hasbro bet on that, when they have the dark elf that everyone wants to be?

Mark shook his head. “Drizzt? He’s great, if you want to capture the edgy emo demographic as well. The problem is, you’ll still have people that want Moonshae instead. Or Cormyr. Or a dozen other places on the map that 99% of the population has never heard of and won’t care to. Not to mention that no matter what New Line does with Elminster, he will always and only be seen as a Gandalf clone.

“But the Chronicles? That’s a closed loop. It’s a beginning, a middle, and an end. The ‘War of Souls’ just hit the New York Times Bestseller lists. It’s not just a ‘legacy brand’. And Bob Shaye doesn’t want a ‘brand extension’. He wants a statement. He wants the movie that Peter Jackson is too ‘prestigious’ to make. More importantly, he wants Dragonlance. And he’ll walk away from this if he doesn’t get it. Don’t be the ones that let that happen. Dragonlance was written as a story. Almost more than it was written for the game.”

He leaned forward, his arms locked on the table and his eyes intent as he went back and forth between the three men. “Think about it: Two years ago, the fans were clamoring for the movie we had been wanting to see for twenty years, and it flopped. Sorry, but it’s true. But why? Sure, the effects were terrible, and Jeremy Irons was channeling his inner Jim Carrey for most of the movie, but those weren’t the real problems, were they?

“That movie didn’t connect with the fans. It wasn’t Greyhawk, or the Realms, or hell, even Birthright. It felt like someone’s homebrew campaign. It was a heist film with bad makeup. And he even used beholders as dumb, trained watchdogs in a throwaway scene. How many people in the seats loved that?” Mark noticed Slavicsek nodding slightly, and the dark look on Collins’ face. Perkins merely sat, unfazed, listening to Mark’s presentation. Or rather, his heartfelt plea.

His eyes gleamed in a fair imitation of Toby Emmerich from earlier that morning. “But imagine what the fans would say when they see the Vallenwoods on the screen. Imagine the scene where Onyx bursts from the well, or the nightmare in Silvanesti. That’s lore the fans will latch on to. And if it’s done right, they’ll be begging for more of the same. And New Line can deliver that, if we,” he waved to encompass the table, “work together as a team. And if we can get Weis and Hickman to agree, we want them as script consultants. Heck, the first few chapters of Autumn Twilight read like a script; we might just have them do it themselves.”

The execs watched his excited motion as he continued, emphasizing the need for brand continuity and partnership, his love of the setting plain on his face. After a span of time that no one in the room bothered to measure, he took a deep breath and visibly settled down. “Look, I could probably go on for hours about why I love Dragonlance, and why I think it’s the right property for this project. But that’s just me. The reason Bob Shaye wants Dragonlance is simple. There’s an epic war story just sitting here, waiting for someone to tell it on the screen. And that’s what New Line wants.”

“It’s what you want,” corrected Perkins.

“And it’s what I want,” Mark agreed, a tired grin slowly forming on his face. “I’ve been walking through Ansalon for more than half my life. I played Sturm at my brother’s table. I’ve read every book, even the stinkers. But here’s the thing: Based on just a handful of the materials I have, in less than an hour I got Robert Shaye himself to take a serious look at Dragonlance, as a real project. And he wants to do this, even more than I thought he would. New Line is going after Antoine Fuqua to direct this like it’s a war movie.”

The three men looked at each other. “Antoine Fuqua?” asked Perkins.

“He directed Training Day,” replied Slavicsek. “He doesn’t seem to fit the ‘fantasy’ mold.”

“That’s the point,” explained Mark. “We’re not trying to fit the mold, we’re trying to break it and reshape it. Can you imagine the director of Training Day making something like the 2000 movie? There’s no chance in hell. He’ll make people believe that this war is a real thing.”

The three executives looked at each other for a moment in silence, their thoughts churning at this sudden realization that this would indeed be a very different movie.

“So what’s New Line’s plan, then?” asked Collins. “You really want to follow up Lord of the Rings with Dragonlance? Pin our brand onto Peter Jackson’s coattails? That’s a lot of pressure on our IP.”

Mark nodded. “That’s why we’re keeping this quiet. We aren’t calling this ‘Dungeons & Dragons.’ We’re not even going to mention the word ‘Dragonlance’. We’re calling it Operation: Redemption. Bob Shaye wants to get the first movie made in time for the 2004 holiday season. No compromises. No Bulgarian parking lots. In fact,” he said with a sudden inspiration, “we would want Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman to guide the vision, and maybe even the man himself: Gary Gygax. A technical consultant. Weis and Hickman can protect the lore, but Gygax can protect the rules and the underlying IP of Dungeons & Dragons. He can finally get the D&D movies he always wanted.”

Perkins raised an eyebrow at the mention of Gygax. “You do know we’re not an ‘old-school’ company anymore, right?”

“Sure, but Gary Gygax is still a part of this game. I read his editorials in Dragon when the new edition came out. Editorials he is still writing, too. The fans are listening to him. If he’s part of this project, the fans will listen to us, too. We want him for the fans and especially the fundamentals. Weis and Hickman are the architects, but he’s the one who built the foundation. Having him on board ensures that foundation is strong, not only for us but for the fans as well. You don’t think his name on the posters will get attention?”

After a brief silence, he slid the briefcase across the table. “I’m not really a suit. I’m a gamer at heart, like all of you. But I’m the guy who’s going to make sure this world doesn’t get butchered. But I need you to get on the phone with Hasbro and tell them to clear the path. We have forty-eight hours to get the Letter of Intent signed, or the studio plans to move on to something else. And speaking not as a representative of New Line Cinema, but as a fan like you, that would be a tragic waste for all of us. Don’t be the reason this doesn’t happen.”

Mark stepped closer to the table, pointedly ignoring the Forgotten Realms hardcovers Slavicsek was trying to slide toward him. “You pivot to the Realms, and the lawyers will be tied up for years trying to figure out which characters are licensed where. You give us the Chronicles, and we make that a reality.”

“You know that if this fails,” Collins said quietly, “Dragonlance dies on screen for another twenty years.”

There was a silence in the room. Slavicsek looked at Mark again, his eyes falling on the ‘Gen Con ‘94’ T-shirt. “You’re a true believer, aren’t you, Mark?” He shook his head. “Hasbro isn’t going to like passing over Drizzt,” he muttered, but he finally picked up the phone and dialed an extension. “Hi, it’s Bill. Get Hasbro licensing on the line. Tell them the Ring guys want to work with us on a movie…and they sent us one of our own.”

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This will be my last post on the story here; I'm continuing to post it on the alternate history forums, though. I just don't want it to take over this blog completely.