Coming Soon To A Theater Near You: Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them

This is "Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them," a textbook that exists in the wizarding world of Harry Potter. It was released physically to our muggle world before all seven of J.K. Rowling's famous novels were even published. More importantly, it's been known that this is becoming a screenplay for a soon to be trilogy! 

The goddess herself Ms.Rowling is the obvious trusted screenwriter for this project. The story will take place 70 years before Harry receives his Hogwarts letter. However, it's salient to mention that this is not a prequel nor sequel to the Harry Potter franchise, it simply is inspired by and branches off of the world introduced by the wizarding world. We'll follow Newt Scamander, the author of this beast book, as he is among fellow witches and wizards in a New York City underground magic community. Supposedly, three films are to come from this, below is the teaser that's been released:

Apparently, it was Warner Bros who suggested the idea in the first place. For that, I couldn't thank them more. I crave the expansion of this fictional magical world. Personally, I'm excited for the time period these films will be taking place in. The protagonist, Newt, was theoretically born in 1897. I'm interested to see Rowling write for/around this period. Assumedly, it'll be wonderfully executed. But you never know, right? 

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

Another aspect my fingers are crossed for to be covered is Newts name appearing on the Mauraders Map in the 3rd film, Harry Potter and The Prisoner of Azkaban. (Anyone else notice that?) I can safely assume it has something to do with Hagrid and his hippogriff. Perhaps Dumbledore will make an appearance within the trilogy. Perhaps hints at familiar aspects of this world will pop up a number of times. I'm not sure what to expect, but riddle me stoked.

David Yates, a Potter alum, has confirmed to direct the first installment which is expected to be released November 18th,  2016. The rest will follow in 2018 and 2020. Buckle your seat belts folks, we're about to be hit with some history of this wizarding world that hasn't even been consumed by Hermione Granger herself. 

Where the Wild Things Went: The Art of Adaptation

"There is no such thing as a new idea." Mark Twain knew it, and Hollywood knows it too. The best you can do is put your own spin on an old tale. Or, you can just realize that you'll never be good enough to think of anything on your own and adapt a piece for the screen.

In all seriousness, there is a true art to adaptation. Taking someone else's work and turning it into a visual and auditory experience is extremely difficult to do successfully. For time's sake, let's talk about books and short stories specifically. There are just as many challenges as there are benefits to adapting a written work into a screenplay. Here are some of the biggest ones:

Challenges:

Condensing/Expanding - So you have a 1000 page novel and somehow you have to turn it into a 120 page screenplay. Or on the contrary, like Spike Jonze, you have a ten sentence children's book and need to pull out a feature length film.

Bye, bye Max...

Where the Wild Things Are, a classic story written and illustrated by Maurice Sendak, is a perfect example of expanding a written work into a film. Jonze had to give each of his character's their own depth, and lengthen the plot to keep the audience's interest for a longer period of time. Almost the entire first act of the film wasn't even in the book, but it was well done and implicitly supplied us with information of Max's home life, and the motivation for the rest of the film.

Externalizing the Internal -  Screenplays consist only of action, whereas novels include the interior thoughts of its characters. The job of the screenwriter is to take the emotions and internal motivations of the characters and translate them into something visual. A great example of this is Lawrence Hauben and Bo Goldman's take of another classic, Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. The entire novel is told in the first person from the perspective of one the patients, Chief Bromden. Instead of having Bromden narrate the movie, the screenwriters decided to tell it in the third person so that we can see all of the characters' experiences.

It's a third person party!

Benefits:

Insta-Plot - Most of the work is done for you. The plot, the characters, a lot of research and even some of the dialogue. Although the plot and many of the characters may have to be tweaked due to length and elements added to the story, the main concepts are there. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, the first installment of the Harry Potter film franchise, is known for its loyalty to the novel. 

The Boy Who Adapted

Although there is some criticism that it stuck too closely to the book and didn't offer anything new, it is a good example of staying true to the novel's plot and characters.

Built-In Audience -  Okay, I know I said to stick to novels, but let's consider comic books for a second (that's a book, right?). We've all seen superhero movies. Superman, Batman, Spiderman, the list goes on forever. But these were all adapted from comic books at one point or another. The great thing about producing these films is that you already have a guaranteed number of viewers. Avid comic book readers will pay money to see their favorite heroes come to life on the big screen. This applies to regular books as well. For example, The Hunger Games was extremely successful because of the giant success and following of the novel it was adapted from.

"Shout out to all my fans."

So go out there, find yourself a popular book, and adapt it into a screenplay before anyone else discovers it. Then get yourself to Hollywood and sell it for as much as you can get your hands on. It can't be that hard, right?

Screenwriting and the Blake Snyder Beat Sheet

Also, I forgot to mention this in my other post. If anyone is interested in screenwriting, read "Save the Cat" by Blake Snyder. He breaks down the Syd Field 3 act structure into a more concrete structure. He uses what he calls "beats" to pinpoint major aspects of the film. Kind of in the same way Syd Field uses plot points to move the story.

And if anyone needs help screenwriting or someone to look over their script I'd be happy to. I have a lot of screenwriting experience.