The Making of the Potterverse (19 page)

To give a sense of the type of mania surrounding the publication of
Order of the Phoenix
,
USA Today
provided a report regarding an Arlington, Virginia, Barnes & Noble: “Store staff passed out numbered orange wristbands to customers who had preordered copies and red raffle tickets to those who had not — and Harry glasses to all. Customers began arriving around 7 p.m. to pick up raffle tickets. By 11 p.m. there were about 300 people crowding the store, and staff had given out the last tickets for unreserved books. . . . Shortly before 11:30 p.m., staff began calling customers by wristband and ticket numbers to begin forming lines, just like airline personnel call passengers to board a plane. . . . Following a countdown to 12:01 a.m., the books were unveiled to cheering and applause. . . . The store sold its last copies within 40 minutes of opening on Saturday.”
A self-proclaimed witch named Marysia Kolodziel, who resides in London, offered this view of Harry Potter: “I am a fan for several reasons. Initially it’s the universe, the books with the largest pull have this highly detailed, well-thought-out universe that almost seems real and, importantly, that you would want to be a part of. You are not just drawn into the story but into that world. Then, through talking about them with fans, you fall further and further in love with the characters, you analyze them and worry about them until they feel real to you. Then you have, in a way, become a part of that shared universe and it is a wonderful place to be.”

A Kansas City postal worker named Kenia Cooper was reportedly almost fired for delivering a single copy of
Order of the Phoenix
one day too early as part of her regular duties despite its being marked for delivery no earlier than June 21. Rightly she pointed out, “I’m paid to do a job, I did a job. It’s a book — it’s fiction — and this is my real life. This is not fiction. Me having to fight for my job is not fiction.” Shortly after this story hit the media, the post office claimed she was only suspended, not fired.

Reading an excerpt from the new novel in front of 4,000 children at Royal Albert Hall in England, J.K. Rowling reflected, “The first reading I did was to two people who had wandered into the basement of Waterstone’s by mistake, and were too polite to walk out because somebody was doing a reading.” She added that if she could have one power a day, she would choose invisibility so that she could continue doing what she used to do — write her novels while sitting in cafes.

Bloomsbury threatened legal action against Internet pirates who attempted to post a scanned copy of
Order of the Phoenix
on the Internet.

J.K. Rowling signs a copy of
Order of the Phoenix
for a young wizard in Edinburgh. (Jeff J. Mitchell/Reuters/Corbis)

Maranatha Christian College, located in Australia, banned the Harry Potter novels because they put the idea of wizardry, something the college deemed evil, in a positive light. Principal Bart Langerak said, “As Christians, witchcraft and the occult are considered evil. It has been widely publicized that many children have tried to cast spells as a result of reading the books, and that is not a view we want held. We would deal with, say,
Macbeth
and
Hamlet
, because evil there is being portrayed as evil, and not as being good.”

Getting permission from Warner Brothers and J.K. Rowling, dancers from Derbyshire and Staffordshire took part in a ballet
based on
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
. Mrs. Parrott (no first name given) from the troupe explained, “The music is beautifully composed by John Williams, and the fast movements in the Quidditch scenes and the elf-like movement of Dobby — we just went from there. I went to watch the
Chamber of Secrets
film and in one scene Harry’s rival Draco says, ‘So you are training for the ballet, Potter?’ and I thought, ‘I can do a ballet!’”

The house used for the Dursleys’ place of residence in the first film in the series was put up for sale at a price of nearly half a million dollars.

More legal Harry Potter problems: This time in the form of Chinese fans who illegally posted translated copies of
Order of the Phoenix
online. Also more Web problems domestically as the novel became available as illegal e-books. A lawyer at J.K. Rowling’s literary agency, Neil Blair, said, “E-book rights are reserved to J.K. Rowling. So any Harry Potter novels on the Net are unauthorized. We also have an obligation to protect the children who might believe they are reading the official work.”

Thanks largely to the success of
Order of the Phoenix
, Amazon.com saw its profits raised by 37 percent.

While
Prisoner of Azkaban
was still shooting, word surfaced that the producers of the Harry Potter films were talking to Mike Newell (
Four Weddings and a Funeral, Donnie Brasco
) about
helming film number four,
Goblet of Fire
. This eventually turned out to be true, with Newell exclaiming, “I’m very excited about directing
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
. As audiences have become more familiar with both the books and the movies, there has been an increasing challenge to continue to develop each of these characters and to make their world real on screen.” Calling Newell the perfect choice, producer David Heyman added, “He has worked with children, made us laugh and had us sitting on the edge of our seats. He is great with actors, and imbues all his characters, all his films, with great humanity. I’m thrilled.” The film was scheduled to start shooting in April 2004.

The efforts of author and artist James Downey to get J.K. Rowling considered for a Nobel Prize didn’t seem to have any impact on those making such decisions. As to his reasons for doing so, and his efforts to use the Internet to galvanize fans, Downey said, “Uniting millions of people around the globe to attempt this ostensibly impossible task is a new kind of performance art.”

The train used as the Hogwarts Express was vandalized with graffiti. The cost of removing it was estimated to be $5,000.

The late Richard Harris’s sons, Damian, Jared and Jamie, held a memorial tribute to their father at a London theater. Among the 300 people attending were Alan Rickman, who plays Professor Snape; and Richard Griffiths, who plays Harry’s uncle, Vernon Dursley.

Emma Thompson joined the cast of
Prisoner of Azkaban
as Professor Trelawney, the Divinations instructor. Interestingly, Thompson’s ex-husband, Kenneth Branagh, had been cast as Defense Against the Dark Arts professor Gilderoy Lockhart in
Chamber of Secrets
.

Working with the producers of the Harry Potter films, J.K. Rowling arranged for two cameo roles in
Prisoner of Azkaban
to be awarded to the highest bidders in a charity auction for MS. “Being able to campaign for multiple sclerosis is the most meaningful thing to have come out of being famous,” said Rowling. “It would mean everything to me if I thought even one person did not have to go through what my mother did.”

In an interview with the BBC, Daniel Radcliffe confirmed that he would be returning in the role of Harry in
Goblet of Fire
. One of the reasons, he said, is that, “It always feels good working with Emma, Rupert, Tom [Felton, who plays Draco] and Matthew [Lewis, who plays Neville]. We have become very good friends and as this is now the third film we have made together our relationships just get stronger.”

J.K. Rowling traveled to Spain to receive the Prince of Asturias Award for Concord for her contribution to the arts, and for the “moral” aspects of her novels. Said Rowling, “I certainly didn’t set out to teach, or to preach, to children. I wanted to depict the ambiguities of a society where bigotry, cruelty, hypocrisy and corruption are rife, the better to show how truly heroic it is, whatever
your age, to fight a battle that can never be won. And I also wanted to reflect the fact that life can be difficult and confusing between the ages of 11 and 17, even when armed with a wand.”

At the end of the month it was announced that a 90-second teaser trailer for
Prisoner of Azkaban
would be attached to Warner Brothers’
Looney Tunes: Back in Action
.

In an interview appearing on the
Azkaban
Web site, Daniel Radcliffe compared the experience of working with directors Chris Columbus and Alfonso Cuaron. “First of all,” he said, “I consider myself very lucky to have worked with two great directors on these films. Chris is without a doubt the most energetic director I have ever met. He was amazing in keeping us motivated and in encouraging us every step of the way. Alfonso, on the other hand, directs in a more intense way. The scenes in this film are some of the most passionate and emotional I have ever worked on, and Alfonso’s style has been very helpful to me.”

According to
Scotland on Sunday
, J.K. Rowling pulled in over $200 million in royalties during 2003.