'Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them' nabs 'Harry Potter' director

LONDON, Aug. 22 (UPI) -- David Yates is in talks to direct Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.

The 50-year-old director is no stranger to author J.K. Rowling's universe, having helmed Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007), Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2009), Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 1 (2010) and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 2 (2011).

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them was published in 2001, and is presented as Harry Potter's textbook of the same name mentioned in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. The book details magizoology, the study of magical creatures, and describes 75 magical species found in the Harry Potter universe. The film adaptation will follow the book's "author," Newt Scamander, and is set in New York 70 years before Harry's story begins.

"Although it will be set in the worldwide community of witches and wizards where I was so happy for seventeen years, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them is neither a prequel nor a sequel to the Harry Potter series, but an extension of the wizarding world," Rowling said of the film.

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them is scheduled for release November 18, 2016. The film will be the first of three movies in the new series.