Steven Spielberg is busy promoting The Hundred-Foot Journey, gearing up to shoot his Untitled Cold War Thriller with Tom Hanks and prepping for his adaptation of The BFG, but the guy’s still got West Side Story on the brain. We first told you about Spielberg’s hope to make his own version of the 1961 classic back in March. There was no writer attached and Spielberg merely expressed interest in the idea and nothing more, but when someone like Steven Spielberg says he wants to make a movie, especially when it’s a remake of an Academy Award winning musical, you’re not going to forget it.
Sure enough, while out talking about The Hundred-Foot Journey alongside Oprah Winfrey, Spielberg was asked if his interest in a West Side Story remake is still there. Hit the jump to find out what he said.
While doing a segment on Good Morning America (via The Playlist), the anchor cited a GMA appearance Spielberg did ten years ago during which he expressed interest in directing a musical and also that report from March before asking if he still wants to make his own West Side Story now. Here’s what he said:
“Well, you know something, West Side Story is one of my favorite Broadway musicals and one of the greatest pieces of musical literature, my goodness, and one of the greatest scores and some of the greatest lyrics ever written for a musical, so let me just put it this way, it’s on my mind.â€
That last little bit would definitely suggest Spielberg is taking the idea seriously and might even make you think he’s really got something brewing, but this is a guy who’s been attached to many, many projects over the years, and a lot of them never come to fruition. There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s just the nature of the business, especially when you’ve probably got tons of material to choose from like him, but until some official news surfaces confirming that the project is moving forward, better off not assuming a new West Side Story movie is anywhere close to happening just yet.
