Howard Says "Dark Tower" Plan NOT Dead...

In the UK to promote the racing biopic "Rush," director Ron Howard tells Empire that he hasn't given up on the long proposed adaptation of Stephen King's opus "The Dark Tower".  He adds that it will be a long time before it hit screens.

Previously the plan was to tell the epic tale over the course of three films bridged by two limited-run TV seasons. Javier Bardem was lined up as the lead when the ambitious project was at Universal Pictures. Following a budget meltdown Warner Bros picked up Akiva Goldsman’s script for the first film--with Russell Crowe rumored to play Roland Deschain. WB passed on the option to make the TV/film adaptation.

King’s Dark Tower novels have a adult edge that, if done faithfully, would no doubt get an R-rating--eliminating a huge chunk of the audience

Watering down the violence in the stories might guarantee a more commercial-friendly PG-13 rating, but would surely draw the ire of the devotees of the books, who would be the films’ core audience

Howard:

"The Dark Tower is something that we’re still working on. We’ve all taken a vow of silence about the progress, the headway, what we think our timetable is, because I don’t think I realized how much media interest there was in the title and how much excitement there was. And yet it’s a fascinating, powerful possibility and even Stephen King acknowledges it’s a tricky adaptation, but to be honest, from a financing side, it’s not a straightforward, four-quadrant, sunny Superhero story – it’s dark, it’s horror. That edge is what appeals to me, the complexities of those characters is what appeals to all of us. And I think Stephen King really respects that, with [regular screenwriting collaborator] Akiva Goldsman and myself, that that’s what we love about it, and that’s what we want to try to get to the screen. So my answer is: it got delayed, it’s never gone away. We’re working on it, and Stephen is very patient with us, and Akiva’s just gone off and directed a movie, I’m continuing to work, but the Dark Tower dreams – fever dreams, rather – are still there, but we’re not going to give it a timetable."

Goldsman, King and Brian Grazer would produce.