1975 War of the Worlds TV pitch by George Pal

[Maurice]

Recently came across some links to a curio I thought some might find interesting: a pitch reel for a George Pal War of the Worlds TV series circa 1975!

Pitch Part 1 on Youtube is the show pitch

Pitch Part 2 on Youtube is the so-called production office scene

Pitch Part 3 on Youtube contains test footage

The show is sort of a weird rethink of Pal's War of the Worlds film, in which the war went on much longer, the aliens retreated into space, and humans pursue them on spaceships.

The reel itself is rather amusing because they've clearly raided Paramount's vaults for stuff to use in the pitch. In the staged production office scene you can see a nacelle from the original Star Trek series Enterprise and a Tholian ship (as well as Star Trek designer Matt Jefferies), as well as what appears to be a model flying saucer from the Jerry Lewis version of Visit to A Small Planet upside-down on the desk. The "advanced propulsion system" one of the designers shows Pal is, in actuality, a 20 year old miniature from The Conquest of Space.

From what I recall in reading old Starlog magazines, the test footage in Part 3 used Magicam to composite actors into miniature sets. Too bad the scene shows off the technology but doesn't show us anything about the show or engage us.

What's also interesting is how the shuttles shown in the concept art look just like Star Trek designer Matt Jefferies' proposed shuttles for the aborted 1978 Star Trek Phase II series. Furthermore, the hero ship was a variation of Jefferies design released as a plastic model kit by AMT as the Leif Ericcson/UFO Mystery Ship.

Given the lameness of the pitch, I'm not surprised it didn't sell.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Jefferies worked on this, of course; he's in the production office scene along with the nacelle and Tholian ship.

 

[MANT!]

Yes, and as the Networks hadn't been bitten by the Star Wars bug...it didn't stand a chance..

 

[Captaindemotion]

^ If only he'd waited another 2 years ...

 

[Allyn Gibson]

Furthermore, the hero ship was a variation of Jefferies design released as a plastic model kit by AMT as the Leif Ericcson/UFO Mystery Ship.

The Lief Ericson was the design that Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle based the MacArthur on in their novel The Mote in God's Eye. You can find out more about Jeffries' design of the ship here. Nothing to do with War of the Worlds; I just thought I'd throw that out there.

 

[Christopher]

Pretty interesting presentation. I don't think it was cheesy, not by the standards of the day. Well, maybe a bit '50s-ish, but the 1975 TV executives that were this presentation's target audience would've been from that generation, most likely.

Naturally, of course, they worked it so that the movie aliens would be seen mainly in the pilot and intermittently thereafter, being supplanted by humanoid enemies requiring minimal makeup, the "primates" and the "robots."

The Magicam compositing in the test reel was very impressive. I didn't know they had that kind of technology back in '75 (although I know it was around a few years later when Carl Sagan made Cosmos). I'm surprised the Magicam technique didn't catch on more, since it worked pretty well.

However, the actor playing Anderson was rather old and dumpy for an action lead. I wonder, was he actually the star they were going to go with, or just a stand-in for the test footage?

Is that John Vernon doing the narration?

 

[barnaclelapse]

I was wondering if that was Vernon, too. I suppose it's possible.

Interesting pitch. It's weird to think it might have made it if the timing had just been a little better.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Furthermore, the hero ship was a variation of Jefferies design released as a plastic model kit by AMT as the Leif Ericcson/UFO Mystery Ship.

The Lief Ericson was the design that Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle based the MacArthur on in their novel The Mote in God's Eye. You can find out more about Jeffries' design of the ship here. Nothing to do with War of the Worlds; I just thought I'd throw that out there.

There are a number of photos of a scratch-built model of a really nice alternative version of the MacArthur on Flickr, here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/blackbirdcd/sets/72157612377307739/

This guy started out with the Leif Erickson and then evolved the design away from it quite a bit. Tres cool, IMAO.

A lot of Jefferies's set design sketches for this show are very Trek-flavored - or I suppose more properly put, they reflect certain of his signature design preferences as strongly as Trek did.

 

[Haggis and tatties]

Its got quite a V feel to it and i was enjoying that part 3.

 

[Maurice]

Jefferies worked on this, of course; he's in the production office scene along with the nacelle and Tholian ship.

Yes, I should have said. I edited that into the original post.

Pretty interesting presentation. I don't think it was cheesy, not by the standards of the day. Well, maybe a bit '50s-ish, but the 1975 TV executives that were this presentation's target audience would've been from that generation, most likely.

The problem with the pitch is that the sample footage in technically impressive but uninvolving. That's what I meant by lame.

The Magicam compositing in the test reel was very impressive. I didn't know they had that kind of technology back in '75 (although I know it was around a few years later when Carl Sagan made Cosmos). I'm surprised the Magicam technique didn't catch on more, since it worked pretty well.

I think it was used a fair amount on TV productions at Paramount. I recall they used it on Mork and Mindy a time or two.

However, the actor playing Anderson was rather old and dumpy for an action lead. I wonder, was he actually the star they were going to go with, or just a stand-in for the test footage?

As to the actors in the sample film, I suspect they're just people hired for the video tests, not an actual cast, as casting doesn't generally happen until you've got some kind of go-ahead/greenlight.

 

[trevanian]

I haven't looked at the link, but there were a lot of Trumbull articles on Magicam in the 70s. I think this show or the presentation had Bruce Davison and Eric Braeden. The Magicam stuff had really sold GR; he was all over using it for Phase II and much earlier, on the previous aborted feature, maybe GOD THING, that preceded PLANET OF THE TITANS