Hollywood to make films based on Hungry Hungry Hippos, Monopoly
Hollywood toys with films based on Monopoly, Hungry Hungry Hippos and Action Man
Hollywood continues to go crazy for toys and games.
Hasbro, the toy company behind the hits Transformers and G.I. Joe, as well as this year's flop Battleship, has signed a deal with independent production and finance company Emmett/Furla Films to make movies based on the board games Hungry Hungry Hippos and Monopoly, and the toy Action Man.
Hasbro, which has a film production office at the Universal Pictures lot, announced the three-picture deal on Thursday and confirmed that the first movie would be Monopoly. Production is targeted to start next year.
Emmett/Furla principal Randall Emmett confirmed that the other two properties covered by the deal were Action Man and Hungry Hungry Hippos.
Action Man is a British toy that launched in the 1960s based on Hasbro's American hit, G.I. Joe, a range of action figures based on branches of the US military.
That presents obvious movie-making opportunities, but a film based on Hungry Hungry Hippos is an altogether more curious prospect.
The board game, launched in 1978, is a bizarre but addictively frantic game, beloved of small children, in which players compete with hinged plastic hippopotamuses to swallow marbles off a board.