Roald Dahl’s family scores £370m golden ticket in Netflix deal
WHEN Charlie Bucket discovered a golden ticket in Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Willy Wonka promised ‘tremendous things’ were in store.
The family of the book’s author, Roald Dahl, will soon have enough money to buy as many chocolate factories as they like — plus a few great glass elevators for good measure.
For I can reveal that Netflix is to pay Dahl’s estate a staggering £370 million for the celebrated novelist’s catalogue — more than £1 million for each day of the year. The deal will give the U.S. streaming giant the right to turn his books into films or TV dramas.
The sum paid by Netflix is disclosed in newly filed documents for RD Payments Limited, which was set up in 2017. The company’s director is Luke Kelly, the author’s grandson and half-brother of former model Sophie Dahl. It’s reported as ‘sale proceeds held by the company’s solicitors’.
Shareholders in the firm are Dahl’s widow, Felicity, 83; Ophelia Dahl, his 57-year- old daughter with his first wife, the late Oscarwinning
actress Patricia Neal; and Gipsy House Trustees Ltd, controlled by Ophelia.
Felicity is thought to have inherited the majority of Dahl’s £2.8 million fortune when he died in 1990 aged 74. It’s understood that all of his grandchildren will benefit from the deal. When it was announced last year that Netflix had signed the agreement, no details of the money involved were given.
More than 300 million copies of Dahl’s books have been sold and they’ve been translated into 63 languages. It’s not clear why his estate signed the deal, but they will have been aware of the creeping ‘cancel culture’. Dahl’s colourful life wasn’t without controversy, and he was known to have made a number of anti-Semitic remarks. In 2020, his family apologised for his comments.
They have since announced that part of the proceeds from the deal will be used to set up a charitable trust to support charity partners in the areas of children’s health, anti-hate and anti-racism.