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Publishers Weekly Children's Features

Children's Titles Come to Life on Screen
Cindi Di Marzo -- 10/20/97
Publishers plan tie-in editions for films based on children's books and characters
The growing number of feature films and TV shows based on children's books indicates increasing interest on the part of producers and entertainment companies in children's book properties. Below is a listing of some of the films to watch for this fall and throughout 1998, along with their book tie-ins.

Fall 1997 Movies

Paramount Pictures' Fairy Tale -- A True Story (Oct.) is based on the true story of two English school girls who photographed fairies in 1917, causing quite a stir among scientists, naturalists and the population at large. Starring Peter O'Toole and Harvey Keitel, the movie opens in theaters on October 24; a preview of the story can be found on the movie's website (www.fairytalemovie. com). Post-movie, kids might be interested in two tie-in titles published by Random House: Fairy Tale: A True Story Movie Storybook and Fairy Tale: Movie Novelization.

This year's holiday season is bound to be flooded by Anastasia-related gift, toy and book items, given the success being projected for Twentieth Century Fox's Anastasia, releasing on November 21. Golden Books Family Entertainment and HarperCollins Children's Publishing will both have extensive tie-in book lines for the movie, which is Twentieth Century Fox's new animation division's first offering. HarperCollins's line, published under its HarperActive imprint, consists of 12 titles trade titles for children ages 3-12, including an Anastasia Mini-Library and a Welcome to Paris pop-up book. Harper will also offer an illustrated coffee-table book, Anastasia: The Art, the Animation, the Movie, for $45. Golden's line of 31 movie-related titles includes sound books, Golden Story Workbooks and a Little Golden Book.

Anastasia, the story of a lost Russian princess rumored to be the last surviving member of the Romanov family, features the voices of Meg Ryan, John Cusack, Angela Lansbury, Christopher Lloyd, Hank Azaria, Kelsey Grammer and Bernadette Peters. Fox's marketing support for this movie, reported to be close to $50 million, represents the largest marketing launch in the company's history. HarperCollins and Golden Books will combine their marketing efforts targeting customers with joint point of purchase materials and an in-story party kit.

Rodman Philbrick's YA novel, Freak the Mighty (Scholastic/Blue Sky Press), first published in 1993, is set for release as a motion picture on December 18. This tale about a 13-year-old giant-size boy who is slow in school, short on courage and an all-around misfit, is being touted as an Everyman story with appeal for people of any age.

Produced by Jane Startz (The Indian in the Cupboard; The Baby-sitters Club) and directed by Peter Chelsom (Hear My Song, Funny Bones), the film is a co-production of Miramax Films and Scholastic Productions. It stars Sharon Stone, Gena Rowlands, Harry Dean Stanton, Kieran Culkin and Gillian Anderson.

The book is currently available in a Scholastic Point Signature paperback ($3.99), but will be repackaged as a movie tie-in, with full-color photos from the film. Retailing for $4.50, it releases in November. For stores, Scholastic has produced an 18-copy floor display.

Other forthcoming film projects based on Scholastic titles include a Nickelodeon TV series based on K.A. Applegate's Animorphs, starting in fall 1998, and a major motion picture based on David Kirk's bestselling Miss Spider titles. Signed last February, the deal between Universal Studios, Kirk and his publishing partner Nicholas Callaway, is for exclusive rights for the Miss Spider character, including motion picture, theme park, home video, music and CD-ROM.

1998 Movies

The first title in Mary Norton's now-classic series of stories about The Borrowers appeared in 1953, and won the Carnegie Medal in England. Three more tales followed: The Borrowers Afield (1955), The Borrowers Afloat (1959) and The Borrowers Aloft (1961). A decade later, in 1971, Harcourt published a brief tale, Poor Stainless: A New Story About the Borrowers, but it wasn't until 1982 that fans of the small creatures whose activities might explain the mystery of missing household objects were rewarded with Norton's The Borrower's Avenged. All of the books were illustrated by Beth and J Krush and published by Harcourt Brace.

The Clock family's forthcoming screen debut, a $40-million motion picture from PolyGram Filmed Entertainment, will introduce this active clan to an even wider audience. Based on the screenplay by Gavin Scott and John Kamps, the movie stars John Goodman, Jim Broadbent and Hugh Laurie, and opens in 1500 theaters throughout the country in February.

Harcourt's movie tie-in edition releases in January. Sherwood Smith, author of Wren's War (Harcourt), wrote the novelization, which will have an initial printing of 100,000 copies. Norton's five original Borrowers titles are being redesigned for an updated look and will be reissued to coincide with the movie's release.

On May 20, Sony TriStar Pictures will release Godzilla, featuring the fire-breathing quadruped that attacked Japan. Random House, which has five Godzilla titles on its backlist, will publish tie-in activity and coloring books. On Random House's fall '97 list are two new original stories: Godzilla 2000 by Marc Cerasini and Godzilla Invades America by Scott Ciencin. For spring '98, the list includes The Official Godzilla Compendium: A 40-Year Retrospective; Who's Afraid of Godzilla?; and Godzilla at World's End.

Twentieth Century Fox will release a major motion picture next spring, loosely based on Hugh Lofting's Doctor Doolittle stories, starring Eddie Murphy and set in the present-day. No official book tie-ins are scheduled, but BDD, which published the original Lofting titles, will pursue a book tie-in opportunity, according to director of publicity Judith Haut.

The sequel to the box-office smash Babe, based on Dick King-Smith's Babe: The Gallant Pig, is due out from Universal Pictures in December '98. Random House, whose Knopf imprint published the original novels in the U.S., has the license for book tie-ins to both the original movie and the sequel, called Babe II. On Random's spring list are Babe: New Pig on the Farm, a lift-and-peek board book; Babe: The Alarm Clock Caper, a peek-a-board book; Babe: The Funniest Pig in the World; Babe: The Mudhole Trick, Pictureback shape books; and Babe: Oops! Pig!, an early Step Into Reading title.

Video Release

Last spring's Shiloh, a film based on Phyllis Reynolds Naylor's Newbery Medal winning novel, was released to video by Warner Home Videos this past summer. Shiloh stars Michael Moriarty and Rod Steiger and was named Best Film at the Chicago International Children's Film Festival. It also received the Crystal Heart Award given by the Heartland Film Festival and the Special Jury Prize given by the Charlotte Film Festival. The film version of this story about a boy who learns the importance of standing up for one's beliefs was produced by Carl Borack Production in association with Zeta Entertainment.

Simon &Schuster, publisher of Naylor's hardcovers, and BDD, which published Shiloh in paperback, jointly produced inserts for the videos advertising the Shiloh trilogy and Dell paperback and audio edition. Warner Home Video released 1.2 million copies of the video in conjunction with a major promotion campaign.

On the Small Screen

Price Stern Sloan's line of small-format, inexpensive paperback Little Men and Little Miss titles is being relaunched this fall to coincide with the premiere of an animated TV show based on these zany, emotive characters. Little Miss Sunshine, Mr. Noisy, Little Miss Curious, Mr. Happy and eight other titles are being offered by the publisher in a pre-packed 96-copy floor display with full-color riser. Designed to be easy take-alongs and priced to be collectible ($2.50 each), Price Stern Sloan hopes to draw a larger crossover market of adults who appreciate tongue-in-cheek humor (Mr. Brave proves his bravery by running away; Little Miss Somersault reaches a summit, only to realize that the next step is down).

Noddy, a popular British children's TV show, is set to debut in the U.S. in June '98 on PBS. Based on the BBC's show of the same title, Noddy is a half-hour program featuring the original animation, reformatted with live-action sequences.

In Development

Annette Curtis Klause's fall 1997 YA novel about a teenage werewolf, Blood and Chocolate (Delacorte), is undergoing a transformation into film. According to producer Daniel Bobker, Klause's story offers the right material for the type of "hip, edgy films that young audiences respond to." Blood and Chocolate is Bobker's first movie as an independent film producer, following his departure from Sony. Bobker said that, as a result of the success of this year's Scream, produced by Wes Craven, who has been credited with reinventing the teen horror genre, the movie studios are receptive to projects about teens and teenage lifestyles that stand out from more conventional horror fare. Bobker believes that Klause's story has the right mix and is an "unusual blend of romance and horror that portrays a lonely teenage girl at odds with a supernatural legacy and forbidden love." Chris Landon, the 22-year-old son of Michael Landon (who came into the public eye in 1957 while playing the part of a werewolf in I Was a Teenage Werewolf), is writing the screenplay.

In the works and set to release in the next couple of years are more major motion pictures, some featuring beloved and classic characters like Babar (Nelvana); Madeline (TriStar Pictures), starring Frances McDormand; Stuart Little (Columbia/Red Wagon Productions), a film version of the E. B. White story; a live-action Curious George (Universal/Imagine Entertainment); The Stinky Cheese Man (Paramount/Nickelodeon), an animated version being developed by the book's creators Jon Sczieszka and Lane Smith; and Shrek, (DreamWorks), also animated, based on the William Steig picture book, which features the voices of Eddie Murphy, Chris Farley and Janeane Garofolo. And in the development stages is an adaptation of Santa Calls, for which author-illustrator William Joyce is creating computer animation (Fox Pictures with Blue Sky Studios). Joyce is also developing a play based on his picture book, The Leaf Men.
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