Director David Yates Says Fantastic Beasts Is “Pure Jo”

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During the Tarzan premier, director David Yates gave a bit of an update on Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. The trilogy is J.K. Rowling’s screenwriting debut, and the writer is also over-seeing the production, including the creative design of the creatures that will be found.

The director told GSN that Rowling is already halfway done with writing. “We’ve done the first one, she’s written the second one, [and] she’s got ideas for the third one.”

Yates also added that a great part of Fantastic Beasts, in contrast to the four Harry Potter films he directed, is that no one “quite has ownership” of the story “in terms of having a relationship with the material.”

It’s sort of lovely in a way. When we adapted the books, you would always have to leave out things that you hate leaving out because they didn’t quite work within the structure of the storytelling for the movie, or the movie would just be far too long. With this, it’s just pure Jo from the first page to the last page.

With adaptations, it’s inevitable that you’re going to have fans disappointed that certain things didn’t make the cut (PEEVES) or that certain interpretations didn’t quite match your own (“Didya put yer name in the GOBLET OF FIRE?!”). Rowling herself calls Fantastic Beasts “a different level of involvement” to which she feels “very very close.”

I’m really curious to see what a “pure Jo” film will look like in comparison to the Harry Potter movies. The first Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them comes out November 18, 2017.

(via Nerdist)

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