Ernest Cline has never seen a movie quite like Spielberg’s Ready Player One

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

As I've never read the Ernest Cline novel on which Steven Spielberg's upcoming READY PLAYER ONE is based, I've never been entirely sure what to expect, but what we've seen so far looks absolutely bonkers in the best way possible, like a pop-culture explosion. It remains to be seen what the general public will think of Spielberg's latest, but Ernest Cline indicated to THR that it will be something very new, as he himself has never seen anything quite like it.

I got to see [it] a couple of weeks ago. I don't think I've ever seen a movie like this, where so many of the actors play two different roles. One in their own body, and then in The Oasis where they're operating another photorealistic body with facial motion capture.

Cline's novel contained quite a number of references to 1980s pop culture, including the films of Steven Spielberg, but the director was very hesitant to include references to his own work in the film. "He was so loath to reference anything of his own," Cline said. "It's not that he's overly humble, but he's just not a fan of being a self-referential or playing tribute to [his] own stuff." Ultimately, Cline and others were able to "coerce" Spielberg into including a few of those elements. "[It was a] is a unique circumstance where we kind of had to convince him to do it. But mostly he would say yes when it was something he had produced and not directed," Cline said.

Steven Spielberg was able to pull off a little bit of convincing as well when he got the studio to include a costly sequence in a zero-gravity dance club which they originally wanted to be cut from the script.

That was the first thing they made me take out. It was way too expensive. Steven said, ‘Why'd you take this out?’ And they were like, ‘Well, we weren't sure how to do it, and we thought it'd be too expensive.’ [Suddenly], those were no longer problems.

That must be a nice power to have. Should READY PLAYER ONE prove to be a success, it's possible that Warner Bros. may want a sequel, and Ernest Cline just so happens to be working on a sequel to the novel. "I had to start writing the sequel last year while the movie was being finished just to stay ahead of the curve," Cline said. "It’s a good problem to have, but if this movie does well, the following week they'll decide whether or not they want to make Ready Player Two, and it occurred to me I should finish. I'd always intended to write more in the series, but I never imagined the movie would get done before I finished writing them. So, I had to kick it into high gear."

READY PLAYER ONE will hit theaters on March 29, 2018.