Tolkien sold the film rights to The Lord of the Rings—for $250,000—to United Artists in 1969. That same year, John Boorman pitched Excalibur to UA, but studio execs wanted him to do a live-action Lord of the Rings film instead. He agreed, and he and Rospo Pallenberg (co-writer on Excalibur) wrote a script. By the … Continue reading John Boorman and the Making of Excalibur: ‘The Biggest Selling Game in America is Something Called Dragons and Dungeons’