Paul King hopes Wonka is his golden ticket to a sequel. The Paddington filmmaker directs Timothée Chalamet (Dune) in the musical prequel to 1971’s Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, the first adaptation of Roald Dahl’s 1964 novel Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. The story that reveals how the scrappy chocolatier became the eccentric confectioner won’t hit theaters until December 15th — but in King’s pure imagination, Warner Bros. will dip back into Dahl’s rich stories for an even wonkier Wonka sequel.
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“I would definitely like to do more,” King told Total Film magazine. “And I’d like to spend more time in this world.”
King also co-wrote the Willy Wonka origin story produced by David Heyman (the Harry Potter films, Barbie), Alexandra Derbyshire (the Paddington films), and Luke Kelly (Roald Dahl’s The Witches), which Warner Bros. describes as “an intoxicating mix of magic and music, mayhem and emotion, all told with fabulous heart and humor.” According to the Barbie studio, their next adaptation of a beloved children’s figure is an “irresistibly vivid and inventive big screen spectacle” that introduces audiences to a young Willy Wonka, “chock-full of ideas anddetermined to change the world one delectable bite at a time—provingthat the best things in life begin with a dream, and if you’re luckyenough to meet Willy Wonka, anything is possible.”
“Dahl was definitely interested in taking Willy Wonka on. There’sdrafts that didn’t really go anywhere, and there’s a short story. Hedidn’t really write sequels, but this was the one book where he clearlyfelt there was more in the tank there. There’s an awful lot more Wonkastory that we have that we would like to tell,” King said, referring to Dahl’s 1972 novel Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator. “It’s not like Dune: PartOne where you go, ‘This is what’s happening in Part Two.’ Hopefully itworks exquisitely as a stand-alone movie. But I would definitely like todo more. And I’d like to spend more time in this world, and meet somemore Oompa Loompas.”
Chalamet leads a cast that includes Sally Hawkins (The Shape of Water) as Willy’s mother; Hugh Grant (Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves) as a singing and dancing Oompa-Loompa; and Paterson Joseph (A Christmas Carol) as Arthur Slugworth, Matt Lucas (Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland) as Prodnose, and Mathew Baynton (Ghosts) as Ficklegruber, a trio of Wonka’s rival chocolatiers who form the Chocolate Cartel. Wonka also stars Calah Lane, Keegan-Michael Key, Rowan Atkinson, Jim Carter, Natasha Rothwell, Rich Fulcher, Rakhee Thakrar, Tom Davis, and Kobna Holdbrook-Smith, with Oscar winner Olivia Colman.
Wonka opens only in theaters December 15th.
