Ewan McGregor To Play ‘Christopher Robin’ In Disney’s Live-Action ‘Winnie The Pooh’ Sequel
As Disney continues its reign of box office domination, one of the most effective tools in the studio’s arsenal has been the live-action adaptation of a classic animated property.Beauty and the Beastis the latest example, pulling in over a billion dollars worldwide (and counting), but there areplenty more where that came from.
One of the many in development isChristopher Robin, a live-actionWinnie the Poohsequel that follows an adult version of Pooh’s best friend. A new report states thatBeauty and the BeaststarEwan McGregoris set to play the title character…does that bode well for aStar Warsspinoff centered on Obi-Wan Kenobi? Read on for the Ewan McGregor Christopher Robin news.
THRsays that McGregor is in talks to star in the film, which focuses on a grown-up version of Christopher Robin who has lost his sense of imagination and become an intense workaholic. As his home life gets worse, Pooh comes back into his life and needs Christopher Robin’s help to find his old friends again.Marc Forster(Quantum of Solace, Finding Neverland)is directing, and this new report saysHidden FigureswriterAllison Schroederhas been brought on to rewrite the script, which was originally written byAlex Ross Perry(Listen Up Philip) and then rewritten byTom McCarthy(Spotlight).
McGregor strikes me as inspired casting for this project. We’ve watched him grow up on film over the years, and he still has a boyish charm about him that seems like it’d be an asset for a film about someone trying to tap into memories from his youth. This whole project reminds me of Steven Spielberg’sHook, another live-action sequel to an animated Disney classic. Since I’m one of the seemingly few writers who actually likes that movie, I’m excited about that comparison.
So what does this have to do with an Obi-Wan movie? Casting McGregor inChristopher Robinis the latest example of Disney continuing to work with people in the Disney family (previous examples include Josh Gad, Lupita Nyong’o, The Rock and more). Perhaps keeping theirBeauty and the Beaststar under the Mouse House umbrella was part of a deal involving a certainlong-rumoredStar Warsspinofffrom Disney-owned Lucasfilm? Kathleen Kennedy, Lucasfilm’s president,revealed at Celebrationthat the Story Group was having conversations about the new spinoff, and how she hoped to make an official announcement sometime this summer. Is it summer yet?
As forChristopher Robin, the movie doesn’t have an official release date yet, but looking atDisney’s recently-announced release calendar, we could see it as early asAugust 3, 2018.
