It's fair to say that Guillermo del Toro is a very busy man, as it seems his name is always attached to multiple projects no matter what year it is. One such project that he has been working on is his own Frankenstein film. He tells Shock Till You Drop that Universal Co-Chairman, Donna Langley, has put the film on track, and Guillermo and his team will begin working on the script. He envisions that the script will take a couple years to complete.
Shock: How has the story remained relevant?
Del Toro: I think it will never go away. Because some figures you can reinterpret in so many ways. You can do Tarzan in space, Tarzan in the future, Tarzan in the past. You can do Frankenstein as a metaphor for consumerism. You can do Frankenstein as a metaphor for the loneliness of man. You can do Sherlock Holmes in London 2012. You can do Sherlock Holmes in World War II. They are timeless. So Frankenstein is one of these characters, in this gallery, that belong to humanity. Their stories will be repeated time and again, and we will be telling them for as long as we are human.
Shock: One could argue there’s never been an entirely successful version of Frankenstein that’s remained very faithful to Shelly’s novel. Do you see yours as that version, or will it be a looser interpretation?
Del Toro: I think the moment that the only quality you can claim is faithfulness… It’s a very difficult, tricky slope. Because then anytime that you deviate from that, you’re betraying the very goal you submitted. I’m being very faithful to trying to encompass the whole narrative of the novel. I’m being very faithful in that I’m trying to capture the spirit of the novel, when I read it as a kid, and how it impacted me. I recognize that it’s both biography and prophecy about my life. It’s a very personal film. In many ways it’s the most personal film I’ll ever make, because my connection with the creature is very profound and deep and I don’t think there’s any other monster that has affected me as much.
Of course most fans are eagerly awaiting an update on the
Hulk television series that Guillermo has been working on for the past few years. Nothing really new to report as he reiterates that the project is on hold, waiting for an unidentified writer to come on board and help rewrite the pilot.
Del Toro: Right now all I know is the official word I was given is that there’s a writer they want. They are very interested in me meeting with him. He’s very, very busy. The official word is we are holding, but I don’t know… After Avengers having the success it had, perhaps the fate of the project may change. Right now officially what I know – and I’m not hiding anything off the record or anything – is that we were told we were waiting for this writer, and we were going to do it with him.
Shock: If it moves forward, would you still like to direct the pilot?
Del Toro: Of course. The reason is that the superheroes I like and that I would like to get involved with are all monsters. Be it Swamp Thing, Etrigan [the Demon], Doctor Strange – which is not a monster, but…
Shock: A dark fantasy saga.
Del Toro: Yeah. Certainly supernatural. I would love to do Morbius [the Living Vampire],
Blade – they have to be monsters for me to be involved.