When exactly does The Magician’s Nephew movie take place?
A seven minute walking tour of the Bank Station set in London that was shared by @NarnianSource on YouTube that offers a definitive piece of evidence by the form of a variety show poster dated August 5th, 1955.
The most significant historic Narnian reference in the year was that The Magician’s Nephew was first published on May 2, 1955. That frames the new movie’s era to the book’s history and brings new meaning to the line C.S. Lewis wrote “This is a story about something that happened long ago when your grandfather was a child.” (Lewis, 1955). Today’s living grandparents who take their grandkids to see The Magician’s Nephew in theaters will experience a film reminiscent of their childhood in the ’50s and bring back nostalgic memories just as the original readers of The Magician’s Nephew would have felt nostalgic about the book’s original setting in the year 1900. The poster does contain one other name which is an Easter Egg to Narnia history. Near the middle of the poster “Collin’s Social Club Members” is a subtle nod to HarperCollins the publisher of The Chronicles of Narnia. There is one notable error in this poster that the date “Friday August 5th 1955” was written in American English when British English puts the day first like “Friday 5th August 1955”. If we really want to nitpick the date should be corrected to “Friday 5th August 1900” according to the book’s timeline, but that is a broader creative revision far beyond the scope of this poster (Hooper, 1979; Lewis, 1955). The film’s production designer James Chinlund is an American, so flipping the day and month order is a very understandable mistake for a minor background detail that might not even be legible in the film itself. Still, the attention to detail and historical intricacy show a level of thoughtfulness in the production that goes beyond the brash dismissal of many fans. We can only hope that Greta Gerwig has a long term plan in her head for how the larger timeline changes fit together.
The framing of the movie around the year of The Magician’s Nephew does raise suspicions and hopes that maybe the ’50s is merely a framing device used to tell a much earlier story. I would be enthusiastic to see C.S. Lewis himself as the film’s storyteller similar to how Greta Gerwig’s movie of Little Women cast the author’s story as part of the film (Gerwig, 2019). While some fans like myself are wishfully thinking that the Summer 1955 setting is just a clever framing device this theory becomes more difficult to reconcile with the mounting evidence showing Polly, Digory, Jadis, and Strawberry in the year 1955.
Summer of 1955
Since this poster is advertising an upcoming variety show it must mean that the film’s scene at Bank Station takes place before August 5th 1955. Bookending the movie between the May 2, 1955 publication of The Magician’s Nephew and the August 5, 1955 date from the Variety Show poster sets the movie in the Summer.
While there are already many alarming changes from the book keeping the story set in the summer is one thing Greta Gerwig is getting right. From the book’s first chapter C.S. Lewis directly states the season of the story and the weather that drove Digory and Polly to explore indoors:
“That was how Polly and Digory got to know one another: and as it was just the beginning of the summer holidays and neither of them was going to the sea that year, they met nearly every day. Their adventures began chiefly because it was one of the wettest and coldest summers there had been for years. That drove them to do indoor things: you might say, indoor exploration….A fire was burning in the grate (you remember that it was a very cold wet summer that year) and in front of the fireplace with its back toward them was a high-backed armchair.” (Lewis, 1955)
(Lewis, 1955)
This reference to the rainy summer weather is a distinct factor that drives the plot forward when Digory and Polly make a great discovery from exploring their home. Interestingly enough the seven minute walking set tour you can watch at the end of the video makes a point that the Bank Station film set was utilizing rain sprinklers or other water effects that left the street wet on an otherwise clear and sunny day. Such attention to detail in recreating the exact time of year and weather conditions of a wet cold summer shows the design of The Magician’s Nephew might not be quite as oblivious to the source material as some fans fear.
Why Summer Matters?
In the solar cycle summer is the season when life is at is apex and winter is the season dominated by death. The summer season thematically resonates with the life of Narnia being birthed and contrasts with the winter of it’s (chronological order) sequel The Magician’s Nephew (Lewis, 1950-1955). Most births occur during the summer months (my own birthday included), so it is very fitting that the world of Narnia was birthed in the summer (Lewis, 1955; Wu, 2023). From the rain in the street on the wet summer day to the production detail of a story set in a child’s summer holiday it is clear that although the film grossly alters the year the book is set it appears to make some small consolation by getting the season and weather correct. The only caveat to the film’s summer setting is that NETFLIX has planned Holiday 2026 release schedule starting with an IMAX premiere on Thanksgiving before home viewing on Christmas Day. Would a summer blockbuster movie release have been more appropriate or is it better to have a cozy Christmas debut like The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe did twenty years ago?
There has been a lot of news recently during the filming of Narnia: The Magician’s Nephew and the changing of the setting from Earth year 1900 to 1955 seems to be one of the most shocking. The excellent seven minute walking tour of the Bank Station set gives a fantastic glimpse behind the scenes and a clear confirmation of the August 5, 1955 date which sets the movie in the Summer of 1955. This summer setting matches the timeline of the book’s publication and lines up with C.S. Lewis’s own descriptions of the cold wet summer which drove Digory and Polly to explore indoors. Despite numerous inconsistencies surrounding the ’50s setting the summer season keeps up with the book’s themes of vitality and birth. The production design seems to be paying attention to some details better than others, but how will it all play out when the film is finished? We’ll find out when Narnia: The Magician’s Nephew opens in IMAX on November 26, 2026. Until then faithful followers of Aslan keep your spirits hopeful as we wait and see what new adventures wait us from the cinematic world of Narnia.
Gerwig, G. (Director). (2019). Little Women [Film]. Columbia Pictures; DiNovi Pictures; New Regency Productions; Pascal Pictures; Regency Enterprises; Sony Pictures
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