Enid Blyton ‘The Magic Faraway Tree’ Director Says Adaptation Will Tap Into Children’s Post-Pandemic Anxiety; Unveils First Concept Art Image – EFM
EXCLUSIVE: UK Director Ben Gregor says his upcoming adaptation of Enid Blyton’s The Magic Faraway Tree will tap into children’s post-pandemic anxiety and retreat into screens as it celebrates the joy of being outdoors in nature, in a subtext that will chime with parents worldwide.
Wonka and Paddington 2 actor and writer Simon Farnaby’s screenplay transposes Blyton’s 1943 classic – about the adventures of three children who discover a magic tree in an enchanted wood – to modern Britain.
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The new version will revive the tree’s ragbag collection of characters such as Moonface, Saucepan Man, Dame Washalot, Silky, Angry Pixie and Mister Watzisname as well as the lands at the top of the tree including the Land of Goodies and the Land of Birthdays.
For its contemporary reboot, the three protagonists are uprooted from their hi-tech home in an ultra-modern London Nine Elms-Battersea Power Station-style development to a ramshackle barn in the English countryside without an internet connection.
Gregor, whose credits include the community cops comedy Black Ops as well as shows such as Bloods and Britannia, is currently gearing up for the shoot of the film in an undisclosed wooded area in Southern England this June.
He took time out from pre-production this week to to present the project, with producers Danny Perkins at Elysian Film Group and Pippa Harris and Nicolas Brown at Neal Street Productions, to buyers at the EFM where Palisades Park Pictures is rolling out sales.
Deadline sat down with Gregor for a chat about his vision for the film and a sneak peak of the concept art. We reveal a first image above for the look of the faraway tree above.
DEADLINE: What drew you to The Magic Faraway Tree and convinced you that an adaptation could work for today’s audience?
BEN GREGOR: It’s a movie about exploring and being outside. The world went through so much change during the pandemic. Kids retreated into their screens and anxiety became a thing, right?. This was ringing around my head. The other big draw was working with Simon. We’ve done a lot of comedy together and both came up at a similar time through comedy.
DEADLINE: Can you set out the context for this new contemporary adaptation?
GREGOR: The story is about Fran, this anxious young child. Her family lives on the campus of a big hi-tech company in London. It’s a comfortable home but there’s the seductive sterility of modern living. They’re all in separate rooms. When the mum loses her job, they end up in a ramshackle barn. It’s kind of a Swiss Family Robinson thing. From the kids’ perspective, it’s more like The Mosquito Coast, where the dad’s like, “This is gonna be great. We’re gonna come together”. And they’re like, “Sure, Dad”.
They think it’s hell but the youngest one, Fran, goes into the woods and it’s beautiful. We’ve got this amazing piece of woodland to film in on these incredible estates, it’s really untouched. It’s like a timeless piece of England that is just pristine and beautiful.
DEADLINE: Can you elaborate about what you said about the film tapping into the impact of the pandemic on childhood?
GREGOR: The kids in the film end up defending a way of life that they really hated to start with. They realise that it’s actually more fun. It’s not an anti-technology movie, but rather an anti-isolation movie. For me, that really resonates. Watching kids come out of Covid, watching kids go back into the world and the anxiety, anxiousness, they’re not used to it. Without overtly talking about it, that is heart, the engine of the film, that sort of heartfelt excitement about getting back into the world in a Narnia way but also the joy and the fun of it.
DEADLINE: Enid Blyton’s work is still beloved by parents and children around the world, but the writer’s image has taken a knock in recent years due to accusations that she was racist, xenophobic and homophobic. Are you concerned that this could impact the reception of the film?
GREGOR: She was of her time. I think that she was a genius and The Magic Faraway Tree is the most fantastical stuff that she wrote. It’s about getting what she wrote and the vividness of her imagination and making sure that we shoot it in a way that feels contemporary.
The last TV show I did was Black Ops, which was thoroughly diverse, and I’m very keen to have a very diverse cast and crew on this and as we did on that.
We’re pushing to make sure it feels modern and that no one can ever say that about our interpretation of it, while still staying true to her sort of zany creative vision, because quite frankly, it’s zany stuff that she’s coming up with.
It has to be diverse to be part of a modern Britain, modern Europe. I come from a Czech background. My dad came over in the 1968 Prague Spring to finish his medical studies in the United Kingdom.
I grew up with waifs and strays at our Christmas dinners, people who didn’t quite fit in. I’m really keen in my work to address the feeling of fitting in and the film is about that. Fran feels like she can’t talk to anyone. She’s anxious but then she is included by the Faraway Tree gang who are affable and pull her along. I want to make an inclusive, vibrant and loving, funny film.
DEADLINE: We hear some big stars are being attached. Can you reveal names?
GREGOR: I can’t but we’re having some very good conversations with some really amazing people. That’s all I can say at this point.
DEADLINE: Looking at the concept art, the scale is ambitious. Will there be a lot of VFX?
GREGOR: We’re building these lovely sets so that the actors will be able to experience what’s happening rather than standing in front of a green screen. I’m definitely embracing VFX. I love special effects. We’ve put the VFX into the art department so that they’re in at the very early stages. We’re working with Tim Ledbury who worked a lot with Wes Anderson, Tim Burton, on Harry Potter. He’s brilliant.
Having Tim in the art department, means we can make the movie punch above its budget because we’re not fixing things in the effects afterwards.
DEADLINE: Are you working with any particular VFX companies?
GREGOR: We’re making our own company. It’s more efficient. We’ll farm out to other people as well but Tim’s going to put together his own team.
DEADLINE: Some of the concept art, especially for the lands accessed by the ladder at the top of the tree, have a very Ghibli-esque feel…
GREGOR: I’m really glad you said that. Ghibli has that combination of scale and familiarity with the foods and the cooking, and there’s a lot of food, a lot of cake in Blyton.
DEADLINE: Is this the beginning of a franchise? Are there plans to adapt the other books in the series?
GREGOR: We’re only in production on the first one but we were building the sets to be used again and again.
DEADLINE: So with shooting scheduled to begin in June, what is the planned release date?
GREGOR: Christmas ’25. It’s a family Christmas movie.
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