George R.R. Martin Is Calling His Game of Thrones Prequel The Long Night

In an interview with The New York Times, author George R.R. Martin revealed that he has been calling his Game of Thrones prequel series The Long Night, although that may not be the official title. Here are highlights:

On the title of the series: “That’s the show I’m calling ‘The Long Night.’ HBO said, ‘Don’t call it ‘The Long Night,” so that’s not the official title. But I still think of it as ‘The Long Night.’ That’s the one Jane Goldman wrote, and they’re gearing up for preproduction. Naomi Watts has been cast, so that’s very exciting.”

On how little of his books will be in the series: “If you look at the published books so far, there’s really very little material about that — a sentence here, a sentence there. Old Nan tells a tale that takes up a paragraph. So Jane had to create the characters, the settings and some of the events, and we had to look at everything that was said and say, ‘O.K., here’s what was said at this point, we need to make it consistent to that.’ We kicked around some ideas and I made some suggestions. But mostly it’s been Jane running with it. It’s set thousands of years before ‘Game of Thrones.’ King’s Landing does not exist. The Iron Throne does not exist. There are no dragons there.”

On another Thrones idea he had: “I wanted to do a show called ‘Spear Carriers,’ which would actually be set during the events of ‘Game of Thrones,’ but it wouldn’t be following Dany, Tyrion and Jaime. They would all be there in the background like Hamlet, and it would be more like, ‘Here’s a story about a guy in the City Watch; here’s a story about a prostitute at one of Littlefinger’s brothels; here’s a story about a mummer who’s in town to do juggling and tricks.’ And they all get caught up in the events. I think that kind of show would be a lot of fun to do. Maybe I’ll be able to convince them to do it!”