Variety reported, that according to sources Eddie Redmayne has been offered the role of Newt Scamander in Warner Bros.’ hotly anticipated “Harry Potter” spinoff “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them,”.
J.K. Rowling is making her screenwriting debut on the trilogy. Though director David Yates may be considering a few other actors, it’s looking like Redmayne has the inside track. WB declined to comment on this story.
Set in New York roughly seven decades before Harry Potter’s saga starts, “Fantastic Beasts” is based on the Hogwarts textbook of the same name and follows the adventures of its author, Newt Scamander. Scamander is described as a “magiczoologist,” which in the “Harry Potter” realm is a person who studies magical creatures. Besides Scamander, there are four other main roles — two American girls and two American boys — that the studio is currently looking to cast.
“Although it will be set in the worldwide community of witches and wizards where I was so happy for 17 years, ‘Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them’ is neither a prequel nor a sequel to the ‘Harry Potter’ series but an extension of the wizarding world,” Rowling explained.
Yates and the studio were expected to meet next week for the two female leads but wanted to make sure Redmayne was locked up before those tests began. Though he had committed to a new project following his Oscar win, he has finished production on Tom Hooper’s “The Danish Girl,” which bows in November.
Warner Bros. and Redmayne recently worked together on “Jupiter Ascending,” in which he played the villain opposite Channing Tatum. Though that film failed to meet expectations at the box office, the British thesp is still in high demand following his Oscar win.
Redmayne is repped by CAA and United Agents. (x)
In a recent tweet, Rowling confirmed that the film's protagonist is a Hufflepuff, which will surely be fascinating to anyone who knows what that means. Scott Meslow (x)
Warner Bros. and Redmayne recently worked together on “Jupiter Ascending,” in which he played the villain opposite Channing Tatum. Though that film failed to meet expectations at the box office, the British thesp is still in high demand following his Oscar win.
Redmayne is repped by CAA and United Agents. (x)
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“Redmayne is of course the perfect choice to play someone named Newt Scamander, as he is a very handsome human man who also looks slightly like a very handsome lizard.” (x)
Vanity Fair: Eddie Redmayne Is the Future of Harry Potter’s Universe
The planned Harry Potter spin-off,Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, has a long way to go before it can start matching the incredible star power that defined the original eight-film series. But now they’re off to a great start, with the newest best-actor Oscar winner joining the fold.
Eddie Redmayne, who was the frontrunner to play “magizoologist” Newt Scamander in the potential new franchise, is now in negotiations to lead the film, according to Variety. The hold-up was Redmayne’s perfectly reasonable request to actually see the finished script, written by J.K. Rowling herself, before committing to the role. It’s hard to imagine that Redmayne was worried about the quality—“Yes, you created one of the most beloved fantasy stories of all time, but are you up to my standards?”—but given theambitious twists some of Rowling’s characters have been handed in the past, he may have just wanted to know what he was really in for before signing on the dotted line... Read more
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The book: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them was written by J.K. Rowling and published in 2001, originally under the pseudonym Newt Scamander. Over 80 percent of the cover price of each book sold went to Comic Relief; by 2009, over £17 million had been raised through sales of the book and its companion Quidditch Through the Ages. (x)
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