With Wonka coming out this holiday season, promotion for the film is going to start soon and a trailer was shown at a press event with director Paul King commenting how he made the prequel with the intention for it to work with both Roald Dahl’s novel Charlie and the Chocolate Factory as well as the 1971 film Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory with Gene Wilder in the lead as the eccentric chocolatier.
Wonka stars Timothee Chalamet (Dune Part Two) as a young Willy Wonka as he explores the world. At the press event, journalist Emily Zemler reported King’s comments he wanted to make a prequel that could “sit alongside” Dahl’s novel and the 1971 adaptation with Wilder’s interpretation of the character, acting as a “companion” to both.
Wonka focuses on “a young Willy Wonka and his adventures before opening the world’s most famous chocolate factory” and explore the “vivid, mythical beginnings of the imaginative young inventor before he becomes the renowned scrumdiddlyumptious Mozart of chocolate.”
Wonka is directed by Paddington’s Paul King and features a stacked cast including Timothee Chalamet, Olivia Colman, Hugh Grant, Rowan Atkinson, Sally Hawkins, Keegan-Michael Key, Jim Carter, Mathew Baynton, Tom Davis, Simon Farnaby, Rich Fulcher, Kobna Holdbrook-Smith, Paterson Joseph, Calah Lane, Matt Lucas, Colin O’Brien, Natasha Rothwell, Rakhee Thakrar, and Ellie White.
Wonka will be released on December 15, 2023.
Ricky Church – Follow me on Twitter for more movie news and nerd talk.