Legendary Entertainment — Hollywood’s high-profile producer and co-financier of big-budget studio fare — has inked a deal to turn Syd Hoff’s classic kids’ picture book series Danny and the Dinosaur into a live-action feature film.
The movie adaptation will be produced with Caroline Fraser of HarperCollins Productions, HarperCollins Publisher’s in-house production company. Danny and the Dinosaur follows Danny and a dinosaur he meets at a museum and the adventures they have together.
Those include Danny and the dinosaur spending their day playing together, going on a trip to the big city, visiting the zoo, eating ice cream and allowing other children to jump on the dinosaur as a slide.
The comical book series, which has sold over 11 million copies in 12 languages, was first published by HarperCollins in 1958. Legendary acquired the book series rights from the Authors Guild Foundation, with the Anti-Defamation League Foundation, ORT America, Inc. and the United Negro College Fund.
HarperCollins Productions optioned the media rights to Danny and the Dinosaur from the Author’s Guild Foundation and turned to Legendary to help bring the content to life on screen.
Hoff was a humorist who created thousands of cartoons in his lifetime. His work also appeared in many other magazines, including Esquire and The Saturday Evening Post, and in a nationally syndicated daily feature.
The deal follows Legendary finding a new home with Sony Pictures. Legendary’s movies will be distributed and marketed globally by Sony, excluding China, where Legendary East will handle those duties.
Sony will also handle home entertainment and TV distribution for those films. Sony does not have a streaming service, and Legendary will continue to partner with other companies for streaming, as it has with Netflix on the Enola Holmes films.
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