I was contacted today, as I returned from travel, by the production company in England to inform me (as our truck wove in and out of various mountain passes) that the hierarchy had reviewed our plans and the options and decided to do most or all of it in CGI. No trip to the U.S., no ship, no reenactors… The gentleman seemed somewhat upset about this sudden change of plans, but there it was.
So, now that we're no longer in negotiations, I can reveal that the gig would have been for the Discovery Channel, and would have involved time, space, energy, etc. based on the work of Stephen Hawking; who would "narrate" the piece. They wanted some scenes of the Vikings at sea during a storm and then observing an eclipse as the wolves of ragnarok devoured the sun. Later they would show ancient Greeks and explain their concept of the cosmos.
The English production company was Darlow Smithson Productions ( www.darlowsmithson.com ). I told them that we are still available should there be any change of plans ("…unlikely.") or any future historic productions. I will say that these folks worked very hard with us, and had a feasible mission and an almost reasonable time frame. A number of LSCo folks also put in a lot of time to try to bring this off; but in the end, these productions companies are the ones that pay the piper, so they call the tune. If we get any further interest from this or any other company in events involving the longship or Viking Age reenactors, we will let folks know.
Meanwhile, as long as the date is hanging out there, the Longship Company will have a work session that Saturday (3/5/2011, 10:00) to start preparing the ship for spring launch; so if you are more interested in longships than in glitter and stardust, please feel free to work with us on the ship.
My thanks to all for their effort.
