It’s not television: it’s Wonkavision.
New Zealand filmmaker Taika Waititi will write, direct, and executive-produce two Netflix animated series set in the fictional world of Roald Dahl’s 1964 children’s classic Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, according to Variety. One will focus specifically on the Oompa-Loompas who work for eccentric candymaker Willy Wonka. No release date or voice-casting information was announced.
The series are the first two projects in what Netflix called an “extensive partnership” with the Roald Dahl Story Company, which will include future adaptations of other Dahl books, including 1980’s The Twits, 1982’s The BFG, and 1988’s Matilda. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was famously adapted for film in 1971 and 2005; there have also been past movie versions of The BFG and Matilda.
Waititi recently won an Oscar for his screenplay for Jojo Rabbit, which loosely adapted the 2008 novel Caging Skies by Christine Leunens. He’s also known for writing and directing 2017’s Thor: Ragnarok, the 17th film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe; and the 2014 vampire comedy What We Do in the Shadows, on which he shared writing and directing duties with his co-star, Flight of the Conchords’ Jemaine Clement.
A biopic about Dahl and his wife of 30 years, Oscar-winning actor Patricia Neal, is currently in post-production. The film, An Unquiet Life, will star Downton Abbey’s Hugh Bonneville as Dahl and Tipping the Velvet’s Keeley Hawes as Neal; it’s based on Stephen Michael Shearer’s 2006 biography Patricia Neal: An Unquiet Life. It’s expected to be released later this year.
David Rapp is the senior Indie editor.
