Netflix could buy Roald Dahl’s catalog

Netflix, who already has an animation agreement in place with the Roald dahl Story Co., now hopes to take it to the next level by taking control of Dahl’s complete works. As Bloomberg reports, citing sources who wished to remain unidentified, “an agreement could be announced in a few days” which gives Netflix ownership of the author’s entire catalog.

Much of Dahl’s work has already been adapted for the big and / or small screen – and some titles have even been adapted twice; besides the tale of Willy Wonka, who has a third film (a prequel with Timothée Chalamet, which is manufactured by Warner Bros.) along the way, The witches also a recent redesign by Robert Zemeckis. However, given Netflix’s never-ending thirst for new content, you can see why the streamer would want full access to Dahl’s work, given that he’s written some of the most beloved children’s books of all time. . As Bloomberg reminds us, Netflix’s 2018 animation deal with Roald Dahl Story Co. was “at the time considered to be one of the largest ever made for children’s and family programming, worth from $ 500 million to $ 1 billion “. (If you remember we are supposed to have a pair of Taika Waititi created, Charlie and the chocolate factory-series centered on that one, including a show centered on the Oompa Loompas.) It’s unclear how much this new offer would cost, but you can imagine it will be worth parcel of gold banknotes.

We’ve reached out to Netflix for comment and will update this post if we have any news, but it must be said that this move appears to be a natural extension of what Felicity Dahl, Roald Dahl’s widow, said. when the 2018 deal was announced: “Our mission, which is purposefully elevated, is to teach as many children as possible around the world the unique magic and positive message of Roald Dahl stories.”

Other adaptations of Dahl already made: live-action Mathilde, the live-action / animated hybrid The BFG, and the animation takes James and the giant peach and The fantastic Mr. Fox—Projects involving filmmakers like Steven Spielberg, Danny DeVito, Henry Selick and Wes Anderson. So you can imagine other big-name creators would jump at the chance to shape one of Dahl’s tales in their own adaptation. Notably, this 2018 animation deal left out some titles (including The witches and James and the giant peach), presumably on questions of rights; While it’s not clear at this point, it’s assumed that this new deal, which Bloomberg touts as being for “the whole company,” would include everything. Here is what was included in this 2018 agreement, for those who keep track:

Charlie et la chocolaterie, Matilda, The BFG, The Twits, Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator, George’s Marvelous Medicine, Boy – Tales of Childhood, Going Solo, The Enormous Crocodile, The Giraffe and the Pelly and Me, Henry Sugar, Billy et the Minpins, The Magic Finger, Esio Trot, Dirty Beasts, and Rhyme Stew.

What do you think of this news? What dream Dahl project would you like to see? Maybe we will finally have Charlie and the big glass elevator (not involving Tim Burton or Johnny Depp in any way) outside of that.

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