Fans get to return to J.K. Rowling’s wizarding world on November 18, and Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them director David Yates says he is set to return for all five Fantastic Beasts movies. Yates told The Hollywood Reporter at the film’s premiere:
“I love making films, and I’ve got a great team, all of whom are like family,” he said. But the commitment isn’t daunting to him: “I only look at it movie to movie.”
Yates previously directed the final four Harry Potter films.
Rowling, who wrote her first screenplay for Fantastic Beasts, plans to write the remaining four as well. She’s already putting the finishing touches on the sequel, which Yates says “feels so different from this [first film]. Much more haunting, like a dream. What she’s doing is really interesting; she’s not repeating herself.” They are building sets for the second film, coming to theaters on November 16, 2018, in Paris, France and Watford, England.
“We’ve set ourselves an ambitious story to tell in five movies, but it’s going to be challenging and exciting — all the things I like,” added Rowling. While talking to Variety (via Screen Rant), she revealed just how ambitious that story is.
“Originally, to tell you the truth, we said a trilogy as a placeholder. We wanted to be honest with people that it was going to be more than one movie, but we were feeling our way. Then, there came a point in the drafting of our story where I said to David [Yates], ‘You know, this feels like five movies,’ and I think I’m pretty certain about that. It’s pretty ambitious to tell it in five to be honest because we’re spanning 19 years, but I can see an arc to five – so that’s how it happened.”
Harry Potter author @jk_rowling explains the decision to make 5 #FantasticBeasts movies pic.twitter.com/yWm2Fw3Mht
— Variety (@Variety) November 10, 2016
The first of the Fantastic Beasts movies opens in 1926 as Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne) has just completed a global excursion to find and document an extraordinary array of magical creatures. Arriving in New York for a brief stopover, he might have come and gone without incident… were it not for a No-Maj (American for Muggle) named Jacob, a misplaced magical case, and the escape of some of Newt’s fantastic beasts, which could spell trouble for both the wizarding and No-Maj worlds.
19 years later would be 1945, which Muggles know is the end of World War II, but it’s also the year that Dumbledore confronted and defeated Grindelwald (to be played by Johnny Depp) in a legendary duel. Yates previously confirmed that Dumbledore will be back in the Fantastic Beasts sequel, though the casting for the younger Dumbledore has not been revealed.
The first Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them also Katherine Waterston, Alison Sudol, Ezra Miller, Dan Fogler, Colin Farrell, Jenn Murray, Jon Voight, Carmen Ejogo, Gemma Chan and newcomer Faith Wood-Blagrove.
Are you looking forward to where the Fantastic Beasts movies will take the story of Dumbledore and Grindelwald?
