Following the recent teasing release of new information about the upcoming Potter play, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, Karisma Indra gives us a round-up of all the information that’s been revealed so far.
For a large number of us, the Harry Potter series was an integral part of our childhood. There were definitely a few tears shed when the last book came out, and even more when the movie series finally finished in 2011. So it was understandable that when J.K. Rowling announced the play earlier this year, there was a lot of excitement.
Rowling has explicitly stated that the play is not a prequel to the series. She has also maintained that she made the right decision in not writing another book; the author believes that once the play is viewed it will be obvious why the stage is the perfect medium as opposed to the written word.
The play was first announced as being in the works back in 2013, just two years after the last Harry Potter film was released. At the time, it was believed to be a prequel to the Philosopher’s Stone. The play will tell a new story, once again centred around our favourite boy wizard, as the title suggests.
Based on a piece of work by Rowling, Jack Thorne, and John Tiffany, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child will premiere in London’s West End during summer 2016. The lucky host of the play’s world premiere is set to be the Palace Theatre.
The stage show, which has been written by Thorne and will be directed by the Olivier and Tony award-winning director Tiffany, is a single story, intended to be watched in two sittings. This would work either as a matinée performance with the second half showing in the same evening, or with the two performances split over two consecutive evenings, which some have compared to the splitting of the last Harry Potter film into two movies.
Tickets for this highly anticipated addition to the Potter universe will go on sale this coming autumn, and for those who don’t want to wait there is an option to register for priority booking online.
The crew involved in the play are very experienced, with Steve Hoggett (in charge of movement) joining Tiffany and Thorne, who has worked on productions such as The Twits, Let the Right One In, and Backwatch. The amount of experience that the members of the crew have between them is astounding, allowing us to hope that the play will be a masterpiece befitting to fans of Rowling’s work.
Amazingly, not much information has currently been released about the play, and nothing seems to have been leaked. Given the hysteria surrounding the entire Potter-verse and the popularity of Pottermore, it seems almost certain that this play will prove to be highly successful. The secret nature of the project just tempts us to see the play even more, and I for one am really excited to the see the end result.
For all of the up-to-date information about Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, visit the show’s official website here.