Harry Potter, 2015-09-24 - Pottermore, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is in two parts

https://www.pottermore.com/news/cursed-child-announcement

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is in two parts

By Pottermore staff writer

Thursday 24th Sept 2015

J.K. Rowling announces that Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is in two parts

J.K. Rowling has just revealed that the play Harry Potter and the Cursed Child will be staged in two parts.

The new stage play by Jack Thorne is based on a new and original story by J.K. Rowling, Jack Thorne and John Tiffany, and will premiere in London’s West End in summer 2016 at the Palace Theatre.

At 10pm today, J.K. Rowling tweeted: 'Due to the epic nature of the story we’ve been working on, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child will be in two parts!'

Like you, we had so many questions and luckily for us, the play’s director John Tiffany and its writer Jack Thorne were on hand to answer some of them.

Bafta-winning writer Jack Thorne was elated by the chance to delve deeper into the wizarding world.

‘Obviously I loved it when we decided to tell this story in two parts,’ Jack tells us, ‘because I got to spend more time with the characters and what an honour that has been.

‘It continues to be unbelievable and amazing that I’ve been given this extraordinary chance to bring Harry Potter to the stage. As a fan, who just devoured the books and the films, this couldn’t be more exciting for me.’

The significance of the stage play is not lost on Tony and Olivier Award-winning director John Tiffany. He feels that Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is a unique production, and we’re inclined to agree.

‘I’ve never worked on anything quite like this before,’ he says. ‘Usually in theatre you’re adapting existing material or creating an entirely new play. With the Cursed Child we have been given the unique opportunity to explore some of the most cherished books and beloved characters ever written, yet work with J.K. Rowling to tell a story from that world that no one yet knows – it’s exhilarating.

‘It shares a scale and ambition with all the Harry Potter stories so in order to do this justice we have decided to present the play in two parts.’

John and Jack are two of the most successful and respected people working in theatre today. Their utterly charming nervousness about bringing J.K. Rowling’s characters to the stage only highlights what this extraordinary new story means to them.

'I just hope we do it justice,’ says Jack. 'I’m so constantly aware of respecting the previous seven stories…I hope people love this play like they loved the books. Everything we do is with that in mind.”

The production doesn’t just mean the world to its director and writer, but also to the entire team working tirelessly to bring the play to London’s West End next summer.

‘There are many people working on this production who grew up with the books, or discovered them with their kids,’ John tells us, ‘and it’s been thrilling and humbling to hear them say ‘We never thought we’d get Harry back. But he’s here…’’

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child comes to London’s West End summer 2016, with tickets going on sale this Autumn. You can register for priority booking at HarryPotterthePlay.com to have the first opportunity to purchase tickets before they go on sale to the general public.

Pottermore will be right here to bring you more news, interviews and much more besides.

Harry Potter, 2014-07-30 - Arts.Mic, Psychologists Find a Surprising Thing Happens to Kids Who Read Harry Potter

http://mic.com/articles/95236/psychologists-find-a-surprising-thing-happens-to-kids-who-read-harry-potter

Psychologists Find a Surprising Thing Happens to Kids Who Read Harry Potter

By Tom McKay July 30, 2014


Psychologists Find a Surprising Thing Happens to Kids Who Read Harry Potter

The news: Harry Potter's greatest feat might not have been defeating Voldemort, but teaching young people around the world to battle prejudice. At least that's the finding of a new paper in the Journal of Applied Social Psychology, which claims reading the Harry Potter series significantly improved young peoples' perception of stigmatized groups like immigrants, homosexuals or refugees.

The studies: The Pacific Standard broke down the three studies used in this paper.

The first took 34 Italian fifth-graders and plunged them into a six-week course on Potter. The researchers began by having the students fill out a questionnaire on immigrants, and then split them into two groups which read selected passages from the series. The students in the first group discussed prejudice and bigotry as themes in the books, while the others didn't, serving as a control group. The students in the first group showed "improved attitudes towards immigrants," but only if they identified with Potter.

A second study with 117 Italian high school students found that a reader's emotional identification with Harry was associated with more positive perceptions of LGBT people in general. A third, which surveyed U.K. college students, ultimately found no association between an emotional bond with Harry and perceptions of refugees. But it did indicate that students who had less of an emotional identification with Voldemort had "improved attitudes toward refugees."

In all three studies, the researchers credited the books with improving the readers' ability to assume the perspective of marginalized groups. They also claimed that young children, with the help of a teacher, were able to understand that Harry's frequent support of "mudbloods" was an allegory towards bigotry in real-life society.


Image Credit: AP

Why you should care: It's impossible to rule out that there were inevitably other factors at work beyond the scope of the study, but if you're a Harry Potter fan, this is wonderful news. It provides some experimental backing for J.K. Rowling's opinion that, "The Potter books in general are a prolonged argument for tolerance, a prolonged plea for an end to bigotry."

More importantly, it shows that conveying messages of tolerance through literature actually works. Potter's journey of self-discovery, then, might some day be immortalized in projects that aim to teach tolerance to young children.

Harry Potter, 2014-07-30 - Variety, Warner Bros. Conjures Up Harry Potter Global Franchise Development Team

http://variety.com/2014/biz/news/warner-bros-conjures-up-harry-potter-global-franchise-development-team-1201271814/

Warner Bros. Conjures Up Harry Potter Global Franchise Development Team

July 30, 2014 | 03:02AM PT

Move comes as studio expands partnership with J.K. Rowling

Leo Barraclough

LONDON — Warner Bros. Entertainment has conjured up the Harry Potter Global Franchise Development team, based in both London and Burbank, to “develop and execute a high-level strategic vision for the Harry Potter brand and its ancillary businesses,” Warner Bros. said Wednesday.

The move follows last year’s announcement that the studio had formed an expanded creative partnership with J.K. Rowling. It is a response to the continuing expansion of the Harry Potter franchise.

This includes, among other projects: a new film series in “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them”; the Warner Bros. Studio Tour London — The Making of Harry Potter; the recent opening of The Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios Japan; the expansion of The Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios Florida; a suite of Harry Potter digital services, and products including J.K. Rowling’s own initiative, “Pottermore”; and a future Harry Potter stage play, which will open in London’s West End next year.

The team, which will work closely with Rowling’s people at The Blair Partnership, will be led by Josh Berger, president and managing director, Warner Bros. U.K., Ireland and Spain, who now adds president of HPGFD to his role. He will be supported by Polly Cochrane, based in London, and Paul Condolora, based in Burbank, who joins the company this week.

Berger commented, “With Harry Potter’s consumer touch-points continuing to grow and flourish, I am confident that this talented, cross-company global team will enable us to take full advantage of the many opportunities ahead — helping to bring Harry Potter in all its future incarnations to fans all over the world.”

Cochrane, who is senior VP and group marketing director, Warner Bros. U.K. and Ireland, will add the new responsibility of senior VP and chief marketing officer, HPGFD to her existing remit. She will focus on “the optimization of the Harry Potter franchise globally through a cross-divisional marketing lens, upholding the brand’s premium values.”

In her six years with Warner Bros., Cochrane has overseen the development of an integrated marketing function within Warner Bros. U.K., spanning films, TV shows, video games and licensed products, delivering lifecycle marketing campaigns for the company’s properties.

Condolora takes up the newly created role of senior VP, HPGFD and Harry Potter Digital in Burbank, and will lead the business development around Harry Potter, with a focus on digital opportunities “to serve and engage fans around the world.”

He joins from Turner Broadcasting System, where he was most recently senior VP, strategic development and business operations in its animation, young adults and kids media division, responsible for the business growth of three networks: Adult Swim, Boomerang and Cartoon Network.

Also moving over to the team will be London-based Suzie Boavida, who takes up the role of business development director, HPGFD. Boavida will work with Condolora on business development, particularly in the areas of new markets and revenue streams, in close collaboration with the rest of the HPGFD team — Burbank-based Xochitl Ruiz, Moira Squier, Angela Kato-Alvarez, Christine Kittelsen, Cynthia Gonzalez and Rebecca Muh, and Fiona Hickley in London.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

Today the 20th of July 2007 is the day. At midnight the last book of Harry Potter is in stores. I will wait a few more days for the Children's Edition.

You can check also the Official Site:
Harry Potter - The Official Site

Potter-Mania
Eager fans line up for book's release tonight

Rowling: "Harry's story comes to a definite end".
How do critics review 784 pages in one day?

http://movies.msn.com/movies/harrypotter/articles/waiting/?gt1=10150

The Associated Press

The witching hour is almost here. Thousands of would-be warlocks, sorcerers and ordinary, non-magical Muggles lined up outside bookstores from Sydney to Seattle on Friday, eager to get their hands on "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows," the seventh and final volume in the boy wizard's saga.

In a now-familiar ritual that is part sales frenzy and part Halloween party, bookstores across Britain were flinging open their doors at a minute past midnight Saturday. Shops as far afield as Singapore and Australia were putting the book on sale at the same time; the United States was to follow from midnight EDT.

Harry's creator, J.K. Rowling, was giving a midnight reading to 500 competition-winning children in the grand Victorian surroundings of London's Natural History Museum.

For many, the place to be was Waterstone's bookstore on Piccadilly in central London, a traditional hub of Pottermania.

An assortment of wizards, witches and at least one house elf, from as far afield as Finland and the United States, staked out their places on the sidewalk hours — in some cases days — before the midnight opening.

Some passed the time by jotting predictions for the final novel in notebooks, while others encouraged passing drivers to "Honk for Harry."

"This is the biggest Harry Potter party in Europe, so it's worth the wait," said Laura Halinen, 23, from Kuusankoski, Finland.

"Deathly Hallows" is the last book in a series that began a decade ago with "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone," the story of an orphaned boy who learns on his 11th birthday that he is a wizard. Since then, Rowling's books have sold 325 million copies in 64 languages, and the launch of each new volume has become a Hollywood-scale extravaganza.

Chellie Carr, 17 — a fan since the age of 9 — said she had pestered her mother to bring her to London from her hometown of Okemos, Mich.

"For all the other books she said, 'No. It's just a book.' But for this one, she said yes," said Carr, who wore a homemade black cloak lined in green for Slytherin, one of four houses at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

"Deathly Hallows" has a print run of 12 million in the United States alone, and Internet retailer Amazon says it has taken 2.2 million orders for the book — 47 percent higher than the pre-order for "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince." Britain's Royal Mail says it will deliver 600,000 copies on Saturday — one for every 43 households in the country.

Security has been tight, with books shipped in sealed pallets and legal contracts binding stores not to sell the book before the midnight release time.

Nonetheless, spoilers have sprouted on the Internet, including photographed images of what appeared to be all 700-plus pages of the book's U.S. edition. Publishers would not say whether the leaked pages were genuine. Bloomsbury, the book's British imprint, said only that they were "unauthenticated."

In France, the daily Le Parisien played spoiler, telling readers how the final installment ends, in a small article which it printed upside down. "Upend this page if you want to know the end!" ran the headline, printed the right way up.

As many as 1,200 copies were shipped early in the U.S. by an online retailer, and two U.S. newspapers published reviews of the book ahead of the release.

Rowling said she was "staggered" by the embargo-busting reviews.

"I'd like to ask everyone who calls themselves a Potter fan to help preserve the secrecy of the plot for all those who are looking forward to reading the book at the same time on publication day," she wrote on her Web site. "In a very short time you will know EVERYTHING."

The six books have been building to a final confrontation between Harry and his evil nemesis, Lord Voldemort, scourge of the wizarding world. Fans are on tenterhooks because of the prophecy, revealed in book five, that one must inevitably kill the other.

Bookmakers said they had taken bets on a wide range of theories — from Harry committing suicide to Hogwarts headmaster Dumbledore, murdered in book six, turning out to be alive.

"It's the only novel we've ever bet on, which shows what a phenomenon it really is," said Rupert Adams of bookmakers William Hill. "We just don't get that sort of speculation over a book."

Many fans were planning to turn off their computers and disconnect their phones in order to read the book in spoiler-free peace. And then, it will be all over.

Amber de Jager, 19, from Rijswijk in the Netherlands, said she expected "relief, but a lot of tears as well."

"I think it will have a bittersweet ending," she said.