Barbie filmmaker Greta Gerwig is revealing a few new details about her upcoming adaptation of C.S. Lewis' epic fantasy series The Chronicles of Narnia in her Woman of the Year profile for Time Magazine.
Though it's unknown exactly how many of Lewis's Narnia books (there were seven in total) will be covered, Gerwig has committed to directing at least two movies.
It seems that before she even set foot on the Barbie set, Gerwig prepared a draft of the Narnia movie. Her intention was to dive straight into the Netflix adaptation after finishing the billion-dollar film.
"Knowing that I’d laid the groundwork for Narnia and wanted to return to it—that’s probably something I set up for myself psychologically. Because I know the right thing, for me anyway, is to keep making movies. Whatever happens, good or bad, you’ve got to keep going," said Gerwig.
Ted Sarandos, Netflix’s CEO teased, "It won’t be counter to how the audience may have imagined those worlds but it will be bigger and bolder than they thought." He went on to add that the adaptation will be, "rooted in faith."
Briefly jumping into her views on the texts, Gerwig disclosed, "It’s connected to the folklore and fairy stories of England, but it’s a combination of different traditions,” she says.“As a child, you accept the whole thing—that you’re in this land of Narnia, there’s fauns, and then Father Christmas shows up. It doesn’t even occur to you that it’s not schematic. I’m interested in embracing the paradox of the worlds that Lewis created, because that’s what’s so compelling about them."
In a previous interview, Gerwig disclosed, "I’m slightly in the place of terror because I really do have such reverence for Narnia. I loved Narnia so much as a child. As an adult, C.S. Lewis is a thinker and a writer. I’m intimidated by doing this. It’s something that feels like a worthy thing to be intimidated by.”
“As a non-British person, I feel a particular sense of wanting to do it correctly… it’s like when Americans do Shakespeare, there’s a slight feeling of reverence and as if maybe we should treat it with extra care. It is not our countryman.”
Stuber said last year that, if Gerwig can finish the script in time, the streamer would want to see the first movie released in 2024. However, the likelihood of that happening is dwindling by the day.
With a production budget of $180 million, Disney's 2005 Narnia adaptation was a box office success, grossing $745 million worldwide. However, the studio witnessed declining profits on the next two entries.
Despite low box office returns, a film adaptation of the fourth book, The Silver Chair, was also in the works before Netflix intervened with plans to reboot the well-liked children's fantasy books.