JK Rowling’s Finished ‘Fantastic Beasts’ Is Wonderful, Producer Says
When the Harry Potter film series ended in 2011, it left a vacuum in the hearts of many of J.K. Rowling’s fans, a vacuum that couldn’t even be filled with any of Rowling’s following non-Potter-related novels. Then, over a year back, Warner Bros. and Rowling announced there would be a trilogy of spinoff films called Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them. Since then, fans have been salivating over scraps of information about the film, eating up the little games and hints Rowling would throw them (including an anagram Rowling made up over Twitter last month). Now, only a few short years after the final Potter film, we have confirmation that J.K. Rowling has finished the script for the first Fantastic Beasts film.
David Heyman, producer of the legendary Harry Potter films, as well as producer for the upcoming Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them spinoff films, has given us an update on J.K. Rowling’s progress on the script.
While at the premiere for his latest film, Paddington, Heyman told the Telegraph that “Jo [Rowling] has written a wonderful script. It’s early stages. David Yates is directing and we start filming next year. I’m just really excited about it.”
Upon the announcement of Fantastic Beasts, fans rejoiced at the prospect of seeing a film written by their favorite author. However, at the end of the day, novel writing and screenwriting are two very different crafts, and whether or not Rowling would be suited to the latter wasn’t 100 percent clear. Luckily, Heyman seems genuinely pleased with the work she has done thus far.
“Jo’s a good scriptwriter, too,” Heyman also told The Telegraph. “She is so smart, and her turn of phrase, the precision of the language she uses, is a joy to behold.”
For those unfamiliar, Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them is based on the textbook Harry Potter and his friends used while at Hogwarts. It follows magizoologist and writer of the textbook, Newt Scamander, in his adventures in documenting the countless magical creatures in the Harry Potter world.
The first Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them film is slated for a November 2016 release, with each successive film slated for release two years apart. There is no word on whether or not Rowling will return to write the second or third films of the trilogy, but considering she’s the author of the source material, and considering Heyman seems so pleased with her, it seems almost silly to assume otherwise.
