Anna Daniels
Christoph Waltz and Guy Pearce will star in The Portable Door, a fantasy-adventure-comedy based on the book series from Tom Holt. The Jim Henson Company and Story Bridge Films are producing the film, which producers are describing as a cross between The Office and Harry Potter. Jeffrey Walker is directing from a screenplay adapted by Leon Ford, with Patrick Gibson set to play the lead.
THR has the scoop on The Portable Door, which will finally give us all the team-up we’ve been dreaming of: Christoph Waltz and the Jim Henson Company. Does this mean Christoph Waltz will be hanging out with some Muppet-like creatures? We can only hope. Waltz will star alongside Patrick Gibson and Guy Pearce in the film, in which “Paul Carpenter, a new intern at the mysterious London firm J.W. Wells & Co., becomes steadily aware that his employers are anything but conventional. Charismatic villain Humphrey Wells (Waltz), the CEO of the company, is disrupting the world of magic by bringing modern corporate strategy to ancient magical practices. Dennis Tanner (Pearce) is the shape-shifting goblin trapped in the organization’s middle management. Paul Carpenter (Gibson) is the lowly, put-upon intern who discovers the true agenda of the vast corporation where they work.”
The Portable Door will be adapted from Tom Holt’s six-book fantasy series. Here’s the synopsis of the first book:
Starting a new job is always stressful, but when Paul Carpenter arrives at the office of H.W. Wells he has no idea what trouble lies in store. Because he is about to discover that the apparently respectable establishment now paying his salary is in fact a front for a deeply sinister organization that has a mighty peculiar agenda. It seems that half the time his bosses are away with the fairies. But they’re not, of course. They’re away with the goblins.
Did someone say goblins? Well, The Jim Henson Company certainly has a history with goblins, what with their involvement in the goblin-heavy Labyrinth. So this might be a perfect match for them.
“We were especially drawn to the crowd-pleasing franchise potential of The Portable Door, with its relatable, gritty humor made popular in shows like The Office, and its rich, Harry Potter-like, high-fantasy setting,” said Lisa Henson, producer and CEO of The Jim Henson Company. “Once we were able to entice accomplished and versatile director Jeffrey Walker to join the project, we knew we had someone perfectly suited to pull together this unique tone and ground the film for its audience.”
Cool Posts From Around the Web: Written by: Slash
