Although the final Harry Potter book and movie are long past us, you knew the franchise would still continue somehow. In fact, Warner Brothers will keep the Hogwarts gang going for a while with the Potter prequel, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find them, and now reports are telling us Harry Potter’s hitting the stage as well.
We’re not sure if this is going to be a musical or not, but the Associated Press confirmed that JK Rowling is writing a play about Harry that will be a prequel before he joined Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Rowling said in a statement that this play will “explore the previously untold story of Harry’s early years as an orphan and outcast.”
Rowling will be working with two British theater producers, Sonia Friedman and Colin Callender, and she continued, “Sonia and Colin’s vision was the only one that really made sense to me, and which had the sensitivity, intensity and intimacy I thought was appropriate for brining Harry’s story to the stage.”
Since the Potter saga ends where it ends, it seems that any further sequels won’t be happening, but again, there is more than one prequel in the works that can explore Harry’s backstory. There’s no potential time of arrival when the Potter play could be opening, but the show’s development will continue well into next year.
As for Fantastic Beasts, it takes place “in the world” of Harry Potter, as we geeks like to say, and it’s a spin off, which we’ll also be seeing with the Star Wars and Spider-Man series. Rowling told The Wrap that Beasts, which is being developed at Warner Brothers, “is not a sequel or a prequel to the Potter adventures. It is set in the same fictional universe…an extension of the wizarding world.”
Rowling also added that she wanted to make a movie out of Beasts for some time, but was “very protective” of the franchise, so we’ll see how these next two installments do under Rowling’s watchful eye.
