Where the project is at in the writing stage:
Ridley Scott: As we speak, I've got a pile of pages next to me; it's like the fourth draft. It's a work in progress, but we're not dreaming it up anymore. We know what the story is. We're now actually trying to improve the three acts and make the characters better, build it up to something [we can shoot]. It's a work in progress, but we're actually making the film. There's no question about it, we're going to make the film.
A bit on the plot:
Scott: It's set in 2085, about 30 years before Sigourney [Weaver's character Ellen Ripley]. It's fundamentally about going out to find out 'Who the hell was that Space Jockey?' The guy who was sitting in the chair in the alien vehicle there was a giant fellow sitting in a seat on what looked to be either a piece of technology or an astronomer's chair. Remember that? And our man [Tom Skerritt as Captain Dallas] climbs up and says "There's been an explosion in his chest from the inside out what was that?" I'm basically explaining who that Space Jockey we call him the Space Jockey I'm explaining who the space jockeys were.
On Sigourney Weaver's participation:
Scott: It will be before she was born! Well, the main character [in the prequel] will be a woman, yeah. We're thinking it could go down that route, yeah. When I started the original "Alien," Ripley wasn't a woman, it was a guy. During casting, we thought, "Why don't we make it a woman?"
On creating new aliens, and whether he'll consult original "Alien" designer H.R. Giger:
Scott: I think, I have to design or redesign earlier versions of what these elements are that led to the thing you finally see in "Alien," which is the thing that catapults out of the egg, the face-hugger. I don't want to repeat it. The alien in a sense, as a shape, is worn out. (Giger's) still around. Once I get more serious and get going, and the big wheels start turning, we'll certainly talk. And maybe we'll come up with something completely different.
When we can expect to see it:
Scott: We're hoping to have it in theaters in late 2011, or maybe the best date in 2012.
On what made him change his mind about doing another "Alien" film:
Scott: Honestly? They've squeezed the franchise dry. The first one will always be the most frightening, because the beast we put together with Giger and all its parts the face-hugger, the chest-burster, the egg they were all totally original, and that's hard to follow. ... I've always avoided sequels, unless I felt there was something fresh.
