Agents of the stars, such as Toni Howard, agent for Michael Caine, were in negotiations for Mr. Caine, Ms. Theron and Mr. Stoltz to star in a different version of War of the Worlds that had been set in modern times. The previous film was abandoned one week after September 11th, 2001. Copies of emails between Hines and the stars agents have been published on the internet. The period version, released in 2005, was a much smaller scope production and starred a cast of newcomers.