By Gary Symons
TLL Editor in Chief
It’s been a long wait, but studios can now produce content based on the A.A. Milne book Winnie the Pooh.
That’s because the book finally entered the public domain in January, after 95 years, ending Disney’s ownership of the brand.
As a result, Baboon Animation and IQI Media are now able to produce what they’re calling a prequel film, as well as a series based on the lovable, if slightly gluttonous, bear.
“When something enters the public domain … there are no intellectual property rights over that subject matter anymore,” said York University law professor Carys Craig. “So, essentially, it’s free for everybody to use and without legal restrictions.”
The partners say DreamWorks alumnus Mike de Seve (Madagascar, Monsters vs. Aliens) will direct, and co-write with fellow DreamWorks alum John Reynolds (The Mr. Peabody & Sherman Show) both the film and series versions of the honey-loving bear’s adventures in the Hundred Acres Woods. Another DreamWorks alumni, Charlene Kelly (Next Gen), now CIO at Winvest, and Khiow Hui Lim, the founder of IQI and CSO of Winvest, will executive produce.
“We’re telling the surprising origin story of the silly young bear and his friends, when they were still kids, in a way designed to connect with 21st-century kids,” said Reynolds.
Baboon Animation is the studio that produced both Angry Birds and Gigantosaurus, and is a story development and screenwriting company for the global animation industry. Baboon has teamed with IQI, a content incubator lab and subsidiary of Winvest Group, to produce the prequel. Baboon is run by de Seve.
Pooh Unbound: “Winnie the Pooh” and “Bambi” Enter the Public Domain
The Baboon team says it noted the success of the Peter Rabbit and Paddington reboots and is planning to apply its knowledge of entertainment for today’s kids to create characters they hope will resonate with all generations.
“I think this unsinkable young cub is totally relatable for today’s kids, with his hell-bent craving for honey and his ludicrous schemes to get it. The whole gang is hilarious, and are even more hilarious as kids, we’re finding out,” said de Seve.
Kelly says that while the copyright protection on the original book has run out, the group wants to produce a fresh, new take on a story that is almost a century old.
“A.A. Milne’s bear has aged gracefully in the last hundred years,” said Kelly. “But what happened, back-when, that made him and his pals who they are in the book? A heck of a big adventure, that’s what – one that needs a big screen. Audiences will be transported to somewhere they never expected.”
Baboon and IQI will release the feature in 2024, which will be immediately followed by the series. However, this film and series won’t contain all of the same characters as Winnie the Pooh fans are expecting, because characters like Tigger, who were introduced after 1926, are not yet in the public domain.
Also, this is not the first new film to be based on Winnie the Pooh since it entered the public domain. That distinction may belong to “Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey,” a horror film production that went viral after photos showing a demonic Pooh and Piglet about to pounce on a scantily-clad young woman hit social media.
