The publisher HarperCollins UK has more than doubled its profits thanks to a hugely lucrative deal with Amazon for the rights to make multiple TV series based on The Lord of the Rings for its global streaming service.
“However, the main driver was a one-off deal with Amazon, where in conjunction with Warner Bros and the Tolkien estate we sold the rights for a multi-series TV show to be shown on Amazon Prime based on the Lord of the Rings Appendices.”
In November 2017, Amazon beat Netflix to a $250m deal with the Tolkien estate, HarperCollins and Warner Bros, which brought Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings and Hobbit films to the big screen in 2001-03 through its New Line cinema studio.
The 200-year old book publisher said the Amazon rights deal had fuelled record profits of £24.9m for the year to the end of June 2018.