Warner Bros. Discovery chief David Zaslav is open to engaged on extra Harry Potter films with J.Okay. Rowling.
During Warner Bros. Discovery’s Q3 earnings name on Thursday, David Zaslav cited Harry Potter as one of many franchises he’s hoping to proceed durind his tenure on the studio. The govt expressed his curiosity in reteaming with Harry Potter writer J.Okay. Rowling for extra Wizarding World tasks following the discharge of this yr’s Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore.
“We’re going to have a real focus on franchises,” David Zaslav defined. “We haven’t had a Superman movie in 13 years. We haven’t done a Harry Potter movie in 15 years. The DC movies and the Harry Potter movies provided a lot of the profits of Warner Bros. Motion Pictures over the last 25 years. So a focus on the franchise — one of the big advantages that we have, House of the Dragon is an example of that, Game of Thrones, taking advantage of Sex and the City, Lord of the Rings — we still have the right to do Lord of the Rings movies. What are the movies that have brands that are understood and loved everywhere in the world?”
Zaslav continued: “Outside the U.S., most in the aggregate, Europe, Latin America, Asia, have 40% of the theaters that we have here in the U.S. and there is local content. And so when you have a franchise movie, you can often make two to three times the amount of money that you make in the U.S., because you get a slot. And a focus on the big movies that are loved, that are tentpoled, that people are going to leave early from dinner to go to see — and we have a lot of them. Batman, Superman, Aquaman, if we can do something with J.K. [Rowling] on Harry Potter going forward, Lord of the Rings, what are we doing with Game of Thrones? What are we doing with a lot of the big franchises that we have? We’re focused on franchises.”
Warner Bros. launched eight Harry Potter films between 2001 to 2011 and three Fantastic Beasts films between 2016 to 2022, with the final one hitting theaters on the identical day it accomplished its merger with Discovery. The eleven tasks have collectively grossed over $9.6 billion on the worldwide field workplace, making J. Okay. Rowling’s Wizarding World one of the profitable franchises of all time.
However, Fantastic Beasts hasn’t been doing in addition to Harry Potter, with the final film, The Secrets of Dumbledore, incomes $405.2 million worldwide, making it the lowest-grossing Wizarding World film up to now. Warner Bros. Discovery doesn’t have any Wizarding World tasks in lively growth proper now, as reported by Variety.
In the years for the reason that launch of the eight Harry Potter films, J. Okay. Rowling has additionally turn out to be a controversial determine over a sequence of assaults in the direction of the transgender neighborhood. Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint and different Wizarding World stars have spoken out towards Rowling’s anti-trans views over the previous few years.
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Source: EW