Kevin Sullivan, the producer of the award-winning and very popular Anne of Green Gables television movie trilogy, announced on June 28 that he is planning a fourth Anne movie.
The Anne movies were orginally based on the eight book series published by Lucy Maud Montgomery between 1908 and 1920. The original novel, Anne of Green Gables, tells the story of the young redheaded orphan Anne Shirley, who is adopted by an elderly brother and sister living on Prince Edward Island in Canada in the late eighteen century. Subsequent novels covered her teenage years, college, marriage and children and ultimately World War One on the Canadian home front. The stories are enormously popular all over the world; even now, almost one hundred years later, thousands of tourists from as far away as Japan travel to Prince Edward Island every year.
The story has been filmed many times, with movie adaptations appearing in 1919 and 1934, followed by television movies in 1956 and 1972 and a Japanese anime series in 1979. But the most beloved screen versions are the television movies Anne of Green Gables and Anne of Green Gables: The Sequel (also known as Anne of Avonlea), produced by Kevin Sullivan and broadcast by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) in 1985 and 1987 respectively. Sullivan reunited the cast several years later in Anne of Green Gables: The Continuing Story, released in 2000.
Sullivan’s Anne of Green Gables was a critical and popular success, garnering multiple awards for both the film and key cast members, mostly notably Megan Follows as Anne. Fans of the books enjoyed the quality of the production as well as Sullivan’s faithful transfer of the story to the screen. The Sequel, too, was well received: although it was not as faithful to the source material as the original, it was nonetheless a careful meshing of plotlines from the second through fourth novels, Anne of Avonlea, Anne of the Island and Anne of Windy Poplars, and was enjoyed by fans the world over.
The third part of the trilogy, Anne of Green Gables: The Continuing Story, was a bumpier ride for Sullivan. He chose not to base the film on Montgomery’s novels but instead to write an original work involving the Anne characters in World War One. Montgomery’s last Anne novel, Rilla of Ingleside, did center on the consequences of the war at home, but it was much later in Anne’s life and featured her children in key roles. Sullivan’s story moved the Anne continuity forward by a few dozen years to place Anne and her husband Gilbert Blythe on the front lines as a young married couple. Given this setting, the film is understandably darker than the first two. Fans everywhere were disheartened by this change to a beloved character.
Sullivan’s new Anne film is to be a prequel titled Anne of Green Gables: A New Beginning. The production will cover Anne’s experiences before her arrival at Green Gables around the age of twelve. This part of Anne’s life was outlined only in the barest detail in Montgomery’s novels, so once again Sullivan will be venturing away from Montgomery’s work and on to new ground.
Megan Follows was adored in the role of Anne in the first three films, but because this film is a prequel, a new Anne will have to be found. Sullivan Entertainment is currently conducting a casting call on YouTube for girls between 10 and 12 who are “kindred spirits. The deadline is July 20, 2007; more details can be found at http://www.sullivanmovies.com/newannepress.html.
