You’d think directing the biggest box office hit of the year that netted upwards of $1.4 billion, won rave reviews, and has been positioned as a potential awards season heavy hitter would lead to an uptick in confidence, but Greta Gerwig still sounds petrified by the prospect of rebooting The Chronicles of Narnia.
Netflix first acquired the rights to the property back in 2018, but it’s taken a while for things to get moving, although the streaming service did luck out in a major way securing Gerwig for at least two blockbuster movies before Barbie rocketed her right into the Hollywood stratosphere.
That being said, she has admitted to being “terrified of it” in the past, as well as revealing that the mere prospect of reinventing such a beloved saga for modern audiences was causing her “recurring nightmares.” It might be time to face those fears, though, seeing as Netflix exec Scott Stuber confirmed to Collider that the plan is for production to kick off in 2024.
“Well, I think people know that we’re aspirationally trying to get Greta Gerwig’s Narnia together and get that movie, which will be next year.”
The last attempt at bringing Narnia to live-action started off strong before gradually tapering off, with the initial plans for a long-running series capped off at three films split across two different studios. Netflix is an entirely different ballgame, and with Gerwig at the helm, it’s easy to see why the incoming do-over easily ranks among the platform’s most hotly-anticipated in-development offerings.
