Hunger Games is Going to the (Near) London Stage

The blockbuster post-apocalyptic action franchise “The Hunger Games” is hitting the stage and will open London in the summer of 2016 in a new purpose-built theater next to Wembley Stadium, said Lionsgate . 

The studio behind “The Hunger Games” said it was teaming with Dutch media company Imagine Nation and US based Triangular Entertainment on the show, which will be produced by Tony Award winner Robin de Levita and others.

 Lionsgate Chief Marketing Officer Tim Palen said in a statement:

Their creative genius, combined with world-class production values and state-of-the-art technology, will provide a uniquely immersive experience for fans around the world.

The latest installment in the series, “The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1” stars Oscar winner Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth and Woody Harrelson.

It will be released worldwide on Nov 21.

The previous two “Hunger Games” films grossed more than US$1.5 billion (RM 5.019 billion) in worldwide box office receipts. 

The books by Suzanne Collins, on which the films are based, have sold more than 80 million copies around the world.

The Bestselling Children's Books of 2012

How about a look at the bestselling kids' books of 2012.  Some surprises and some, not so much...

For children’s books, without a doubt, the Hunger Games was the story of the year. Its performance far exceeded all other books for children and teens.

 In 2012 Suzanne Collins’s dystopian trilogy sold an astounding 27.7 million copies: 15 million print books and 12.7 million e-books. Of that print number, 8.8 million was for hardcovers, since only the first of the three books is available in paperback. 

Though the Hunger Games was already a huge phenomenon before the March 2012 release of the Lionsgate film, the movie launched book sales into the stratosphere. Back in 2010, Hunger Games books sold 4.3 million copies, which jumped to 9.2 million in 2011; that number tripled in 2012, making for a 201% increase over previous year sales. 

Rick Riordan’s books show a different sales pattern, because a movie is not currently driving sales (the first film from his Percy Jackson and the Olympians series, The Lightning Thief, was released in 2010; Sea of Monsters is due in theaters this August).

 Riordan’s various myth-based series sold a combined 5.6 million copies in 2012 (2.52 million in hardcover, 1.79 million in paper, and 1.27 million e-books). Those numbers are up slightly over 2011, when five million books were sold, though still down from 2010’s high-water mark of 10 million.

Other bestselling franchises of note: a combined 2.7 million copies sold of James Patterson’s assorted series; 2.1 million copies sold of Rachel Renée Russell’s Dork Diaries; two million copies of the first two books in Veronica Roth’s Divergent trilogy (#3 is due out this October); and 1.4 million Big Nate books by Lincoln Peirce. 

Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series may have declined from its glory days, but it still sold 1.1 million in 2012, with almost half of that coming from e-books. Harry Potter, however, is virtually gone from the lists, with just one title (the first in the series) appearing on our paperback backlist chart.

Figures were supplied by RandomHouse in confidence for ranking purposes only; Penguin supplied e-book figures in confidence for ranking purposes only.

For all you Hunger Games fans, author Suzanne Collins has struck again!  This time, though, it is with a children's book called Year of the Jungle.  The story is based on the year her father served in Viet Nam.  It is illustrated by James Proimos.

I thought it would be interesting to post the news even though it is now everywhere.  But the back story is what matters here.  It is an autobiographical book of a time when ( alas, now as well) fathers and/or mothers were gone for large amounts of time serving their country.  

When young Suzy’s father leaves for Viet Nam, she struggles to deal with his absence. What is the jungle like? Will her father be safe? When will he return? The months slip by, marked by the passing of the familiar holidays and the postcards that her father sends. With each one, he feels more and more distant, and when he returns, Suzy must learn that even though war has changed him, he still loves her just the same.

In her own words:

For several years I had this little wicker basket next to my writing chair with the postcards my dad had sent me from Viet Nam and photos of that year. But I could never quite find a way into the story. It has elements that can be scary for the audience and it would be easy for the art to reinforce those. It could be really beautiful art but still be off-putting to a kid, which would defeat the point of doing the book. 

Then one day I was having lunch with Jim and telling him about the idea and he said, ‘That sounds fantastic.’ I looked at him and I had this flash of the story through his eyes, with his art. It was like being handed a key to a locked door. So, I just blurted out, ‘Do you want to do it?’ Fortunately he said yes. That afternoon, on the train ride home, the book started unfolding in my head. There’s a natural humor and sense of fun to his drawing style that makes the story approachable. As the emotional life of the main character evolves into darker places, the pictures beautifully keep pace with it, but they never lose that Proimos quality. His art made telling the story possible.”

 The Year of the Jungle is published by Scholastic and will be available in stores September, 2013.