Warners and MGM team up to end years of speculation, apparently...

An unnamed source intimately involved in the unofficial preproduction of The Hobbit reported today that Warner Brothers and MGM Studios have jointly agreed to give the official greenlight for production to move forward on JRR Tolkien’s celebrated prequel to The Lord of the Rings.

Peter Jackson, initially penciled in as co-writer and producer under original director Guillermo del Toro, will once again take up directing duties. Del Toro resigned the position in May, citing his wish to move on to other projects after The Hobbit’s preproduction became bogged down in copyright battles and studio delays. MGM Studio’s 50% stake in The Hobbit franchise, along with its crumbling finances, led to one of the most closely-watched and infamously-torturous preproductions in film history. Several actors and crew members hinted at pulling out of the project at various times, citing uneasiness with the film’s instability, leading to widespread speculation that The Hobbit might eventually be scrapped entirely. Today’s unofficial announcement would seem to put these fears to rest, at least for the time being.

The source reported that today’s greenlight means that official production will begin in February 2011, as long as the project’s other current stumbling block is resolved – a bitter labor dispute that has suddenly arisen in recent weeks between the producers and the Screen Actors Guild. Other sources close to that conflict have reported confidence that the dispute will be ironed out in the coming weeks to allow production to move forward once and for all.

An official comment by MGM Studios, Warner Brothers, or New Line Cinema has not yet been made. The adaptation of The Hobbit is planned to be split into two films, with the first one scheduled to be released in December of 2012.

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