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Ever since Harry began his journey, we’ve been told that “The wand chooses the wizard.” But, on set of the Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them movie, the actors got to design their characters’ wands themselves.

“I sort of assumed that I would have a wand sort of plopped in my hand,” Eddie Redmayne tells Entertainment Weekly. But when he found out he got to choose the wand for the main character, Newt Scamander, he put a lot of thought into the design.

“These amazing props designers come, and then you have really a quite intricate discussion with [director] David Yates about what qualities Newt has,” Eddie continued. He wanted Newt’s wand to match his personality, to be a reflection of who he was. Eddie didn’t want the wand to be too complex of a design, Newt isn’t a “showy guy”. But he did want the audience to be able to see the history in it, all that it’s been through, with scratches and burn marks up and down the ash wood.

But for the handle, they were sort of talking about whether it should be horn or leather, and I didn’t like the idea of like animal products being used, given that he’s a zoologist. So in the end, they came up with this idea of sand shell… and it has a slightly mother-of-pearly feel. So we had all these discussions and went back and forth with designs, and when the thing arrived I was pretty excited. My inner 9-year-old was having a disco, and then I was actually presented with it!”

Read the full interview with Eddie Redmayne here! Be sure to catch Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them in theaters November 18!

With the heavily anticipated and exciting launch of ‘Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them’ due to hit screens this November, Leaky was not only present at the San Diago Comic-Con event, but also lucky enough to get some behind the scenes action from our two representatives watching the live cast interviews unfold, from the Great Hall at Leavesden Studios in London!

Prior to the Live interviews commencing at Comic-Con, across the pond in London, we eagerly awaited the main event of the evening and took time to appreciate the Harry Potter Studios in all it’s glory! From famous sets to beautifully executed props with a magical aesthetic, the evening consisted of everything J.K. as we able to indulge in ultimate wizarding fan entertainment!

After a fantastic tour, fans were guided to a private screening, showing us the newly released trailer of ‘Fantastic Beasts’. Watch the trailer here! (If you havent’t seen it already–it’s amazing!)

Finally the Great Hall doors were opened, and along with some limited edition, ‘Newt Scamander’ wands gifted by Warner Bros, the audience was seated ready to go live with everyone at the SDCC exclusive event! The interaction with the cast was brilliant, with Ezra Miller and Dan Fogler receiving a particularly cheerful response from our London audience as they made the interview even more fun amongst their talented co-stars.

As a perfect round off to the already magical evening at the Warner Bros Studios, we were given a glimpse at the extraordinary 1920’s costumes used in the movie. The wizarding world felt very much present as fans took a good look at the very individual looks presented, but they definitely emitted something fresh and original to keep everyone on their toes for the latest Rowling installment!

Over in San Diego, Carianne and Tabitha met up with Warner Bros to take seats across from the Fantastic Beasts cast, as everyone prepared for a live Q&A with the cast of one of the most anticipated films of the year. Carianne, a proud Hufflepuff (just like Newt!) from San Diego, and Tabitha a proud Gryffindor, with a lot of Hufflepuff qualities mixed in, wrote about their experience at the events unfolding at SDCC 2016.

Carianne described what it was like behind the scenes, saying:

Being in the room in San Diego during the livestream was an incredible experience. The Fantastic Beasts group was so close to me that I couldn’t even fit them all in one picture! When they entered the room, the cast was buzzing with excitement over how well their Hall H presentation had gone (that room holds 6,500 people, so it’s a pretty big deal). Their energy was electrifying and contagious and an absolute joy to watch!

Then the host announced “2 minutes till live!” and the room suddenly became still and silent with anticipation. To lighten things up again, Ezra Miller started cracking jokes, such as giving us signals to follow during the live stream: He said if he tugged his ear we were supposed to laugh, and if he scratched his nose we were supposed to cheer! He was kidding, of course, but he got everyone laughing and really livened the room up again. He was such a riot! (Ezra also made a few hilarious quips after the Leavesden host said she wanted to “Take an Ezra Miller home,” but those might be the kind of things he would rather I did not share with the internet.)

After the livestream, they stood on the stage talking to each other for a few moments, looking just like a group of friends rather than co-movie-stars. It was clear that this cast really gets along well with each other. Their was a friendly and supportive demeanor among all of them. It honestly just made me even MORE excited for the film to come out! November can’t come soon enough

As the even ended, a few of the cast members gave a little bit of attention afterward to the fans that were in the room. They didn’t have a lot of time (as they were running late to make it to their next event), but just a “thank you for your question!”, a high-five, or a quick photo went a long way. They were in no way obligated to do any of those things — they just did it because they are nice. My only regret is that I couldn’t spend more time talking with them! Maybe someday…

There was a great spirit of camaraderie between all of the writers/interviews there. I talked a bit with a couple of writers there, one representing Snitchseeker and the other MuggleNet. We got to know each other a little before the interview, and we all expressed how excited we were for this opportunity. 

To me, as someone who has never been behind-the-scenes for something like this, it was fascinating how something as seemingly simple as an interview takes so much preparation by a host of different people. All of the camera operators had to prepare their equipment and test it extensively; other members of the crew had to test the live-feed between San Diego and Leavesden to make sure it worked properly; and of course, there were quite a few people dedicated solely to making sure the actors were ready. 

On a light note, the room the interview took place in was *tiny*! It was maybe a fifth of the size of the Great Hall shown in Leavesden. The stage took up about half of the room, and there was hardly any free space for people to move around in. 

Unfortunately, the cast couldn’t stick around for long after the interview. They were rushed out pretty much immediately afterwards to go sign autographs at Comic Con. 

Thank you to Georgia, Gemma, Tabitha and Carianne for attending the Fantastic Beasts Live Q&A events both in London and SDCC 2016. The video of the event can be seen here.

We have been covering the unveilings of exclusive material at San Diego Comic Con’s Fantastic Beasts panel – first a trailer, and now an exclusive Q&A event with the cast – featuring a question from Leaky!

We’re live now with the cast of #FantasticBeasts and the NEW TRAILER. #SDCC2016 pic.twitter.com/g1sBRhAGiu

— Fantastic Beasts (@FantasticBeasts) July 23, 2016

We’re live at #SDCC2016 with the cast of #FantasticBeasts. Follow us on Snapchat for more magic. – Wizarding_World pic.twitter.com/ufAIlK4r9w

— Fantastic Beasts (@FantasticBeasts) July 23, 2016

Present at the event were: Director David Yates, Producer David Heyman, Ezra Miller (Credence), Collin Farrell (Percival Graves), Eddie Redmayne (Newt Scamander), Katherine Waterston (Tina Goldstein), Dan Fogler (Jacob Kowalski) and Alison Sudol (Queenie Goldstein).

In the U.K., fans (and Leaky) were in the Great Hall at Leavesden Studios to take part in the live stream Q&A, where Fantastic Beasts costumes and props were being flaunted – unfortunately only for this exclusive event. Georgia and Gemma represented Leaky in London, so keep posted for more updates on this!

Carianne and Tabitha attended Comic-Con in San Diego on behalf of The Leaky Cauldron, Carianne managed to ask what Eddie, Katherine, Dan and Alison’s favourite parts about the wizarding world are:

Alison answered “Anything is possible, and also that it’s a beautiful world, it’s close enough to our world that it feels real and yet the possibilities and just the wonder of it, on just the tiniest little details how magic is sort of workaday in the world is just constantly inspiring” 

Katherine says “I think the idea of a parallel universe is just something I think we can all relate to. Of course children have that sense and we kind of grow up and we are kind of bred out or encouraged to stop thinking that way and stop seeing  the beauty and the possibility and the magic around us, and to consider it in this much more literal way that there could be a simultaneous world happening around us that we might not be conscious of, that we might be able to notice if you tune into it or look for it … I love that idea” 

Presenter Edith Bowman asked what it was like in San Diego when the brand new trailer was shown to audiences, and Eddie Redmayne jumped straight in with his answer, clearly excited to be at such a huge event:

“You hear so much about Comic-Con, the moment you actually walk on stage, it’s like no sensory experience you can possibly imagine – it’s so overwhelming, but so exciting”

According to Redmayne, there were people dressed as Newt Scamander in the audience!

Ezra Miller’s character has been kept closely under wraps (he does, however, feature in the new Fantastic Beasts poster), so his answer was understandably more discrete:

“I can’t tell you my favourite scene” he says, but said his favourite thing about working on the film was working with Collin Farrell, Eddie Redmayne and Samantha Morton (Mary Lou).

Alison Sudol says she is a “big Harry Potter fan” so is obviously excited to be promoting Fantastic Beasts at such a great event. “You can’t help but feel like a kid” she says, “It is magical, it’s magical to be a part of this world and to have a continuation of the universe that we all fell in love with, but it’s something new, something different” 

Dan Fogler is a loyal Comic-Con fan, who says he’s been attending the event for probably the past 15 years, and compares the excitement of attending 2016’s event to 2015:

“Last year I didn’t have much going on … then I got the call from my agent saying you know, ‘Next Comic-Con’s gonna be a lot different’, and they were right.” 

Pottermore asked the first time Eddie Redmayne learned to use a wand, which apparently happened in what turned out to be a slightly awkward experience during screen tests for the film:

“I remember David said very kindly ‘Ed, just choose a wand’ and I was like *HUGE GASP*. What was extraordinary was that your inner 9-year-old has waited for this moment all your life, and I picked the thing up, and I got complete stage fright. I had no idea what to do with it – it looked really odd in my hand so in the end I actually went back and looked at some of the Harry Potter films and looked at Dan and Emma and Rupert’s work and thieved an idea or two!”

Alison Sudol echoed this ‘stage fright’, saying that she was also concerned about whether the wand was actually magic, but that after the initial shock is over with “it becomes quite addictive” – apparently she’d found herself actually walking around at home with a wand!

Katherine Waterston said that the muscles involved in wand work were a surprise for her, saying she got a case of ‘wand elbow’.

SnitchSeeker then asked Eddie Redmayne what makes Newt Scamander a true Hufflepuff. Eddie said he’d recently taken the Pottermore sorting test:

“I’d been holding off doing it for an age because I couldn’t believe it would actually work, and I was sorted into Hufflepuff and it was the most exciting moment of my life”

“It’s his heart – he’s a complicated, knotty, at moments spiky character, but he has a wonderful heart and a passion for his creatures, and I suppose it’s those qualities which I associated with a Hufflepuff”

You can view the trailer and the full Q&A in the video on the Fantastic Beasts below, and check out our break-down of the trailer here!

Thank you to Carianne for asking Leaky’s question, and to Alison Sudol and Katherine Waterston for answering it! Many thanks to Tabitha, who joined Carianne and represented Leaky at SDCC 2016, and Gemma and Georgia, who joined the festivities at Leavesden Studios in London on Leaky’s behalf–thank you!!!

Jamie Parker, Paul Thornley and Noma Dumezweni are currently portraying Harry, Ron and Hermione on stage in Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, which opens for official performances on July 30th. The outside of Palace Theatre has been slowly growing into a masterpiece, adding more Potter-themed decorations in preparation for preview performances coming to an end. The new trio spoke to The Telegraph about their thoughts on how the process is going so far, and their reactions to being a part of a global phenomenon.

“It was absolute craziness, people were so pumped up” Paul Thornley  said, on seeing people wait outside the theatre prior to the first preview performance.. Noma simply stated: “This is quite big.”

Jamie Parker later says:

“That benign attention and pressure has been the wind at our backs,” he says. “The audience [mostly aged 25 to 35] have encouraged us and willed us to succeed the whole way. Generally in the theatre you spend some portion of the performance convincing people they have done the right thing in buying the ticket; that this is the play they want to watch. Never in our lives have we been able to hit the ground at full sprint like this.”

Paul Thornley is just happy it’s a solid job:

“It’s extraordinary to be in a new show in the West End and know you’re not going to close,” says Thornley. “That’s nice.”

This interview actually took part in the very room where Thornley, Parker and Dumezweni discovered that they had made the bill – the basement bar of the Palace Theatre. According to The Telegraph, being a part of the Potter stories instantly had an impact on the three actors’ lives:

“All three actors are discovering the transformative powers of Potter even before the show officially opens next Thursday. “My children finally think I’m doing something worthwhile,” says Thornley, who has two daughters, Katy-Ann, 16, and Florence, eight. “That’s glorious. I could be playing Hamlet at the RSC and they wouldn’t give a monkey’s, but Ron Weasley… it’s got currency in the playground. Suddenly I’m worth talking to.”

The actors were sworn to keep their wizardly identities secret until the cast was announced, but Thornley mistook the release date and told Florence a week in advance. “By which time she had told most of her class, her teacher and anyone else who wanted to know that her dad was Ron Weasley. So keeping the secret starts at home for me. I learnt a big lesson. She’s gorgeous but she’ll make a terrible spy.””

On J.K. Rowling asking preview audiences to #KeeptheSecrets:

“The hashtag KeeptheSecrets is a beautiful thing,” says Dumezweni, whose nine-year-old daughter, Qeiva, took her insider responsibility so seriously that she asked: “Can I tell them it’s in two parts?”

“J K Rowling is not a King John,” says Parker. “She doesn’t assume disloyalty. She assumes the fan base want to protect the secret. Spoilers are inevitable. If you’re looking for them, you’re going to find them. But it’s still overwhelmingly easy to turn up to the theatre knowing nothing about it.”

Noma then sums up the feeling of 2016 in a few beautiful sentences – we’re getting Fantastic Beasts and Cursed Child all in one year, and we know that this play won’t let fans down:

“There’s a communion,” says Dumezweni. “When the lights go down we’re all in there together and that’s what the keeping of secrets is. These people in their gut and their soul have travelled with Harry and Ron and Hermione and the other characters for years.” 

Paul Thornley has been in Les Miserables, but we’re glad to hear that he believes “Being a wizard is the best job ever”. The trio tell The Telegraph that the audience are often audibly in awe of the performances, Parker calling the sounds ‘a goldmine':

“All you want is a story that people want to be told. Of course we’ve got lots of toys and bells and whistles but it is not merely spectacle. What people care about is the internal life of these characters, the development of relationships and all the pressures and crises they experience. If we’d thought it was a big, cynical toys-only production, I’m pretty sure we’d have had nothing to do with it.”

The actors then discuss the plot of the play (don’t worry – no spoilers!):

 “As soon as you bring a child into the world, you feel guilty,” says Thornley. “Am I doing it right? Am I doing it wrong? It continues. There are different problems all the way through. That comes across hugely in the play. It’s clever and it’s complex and it’s troubling sometimes because you empathise with these problems.”

Dumezweni and Thornley in particular faced backlash when their casting was announced, entirely based on their appearances (Rowling herself, their co-workers and other Potter alumni have since backed their performance as actors, giving them their full support). The Telegraph documented their reactions:

The actress [Dumezweni], who collected an Olivier award for her role in A Raisin in0 the Sun, and recently excelled in the title role in Linda at the Royal Court Theatre when Kim Cattrall had to pull out, treats the fuss with disdain. “You are looking at me. This is the skin colour I have. You choose to use the word ‘black’. I am just an actress playing Hermione.” She is pleased that mothers regard her as a beacon for their mixed-race daughters.

To quislings who don’t think Thornley is red-headed enough to be Ron Weasley, the actor replies: “I am ginger in my soul.”

Cursed Child will be opening officially next Thursday (30th July). Read more over at The Telegraph here!

Yesterday, Evanna Lynch attended the Giffoni Film Festival held in Salerno (Italy), after starring in My Name is Emily, which featured in the Generator +16 competition at the event. Of course, many Potter fans attended the festival to ask questions, but Evanna also had some wisdom of her own to share.

Evanna was part of the Potter community long before she was cast as Luna at 14 years old, so it makes sense that she’d have ideas about where she  would have liked the plot to go. The bonus of being cast was that J.K. Rowling was right there, available to speak to about ideas, and maybe get a few hints at the story along the way. Evanna did not waste this opportunity, telling Rowling a very interesting idea she’d had for the development of Luna’s character:

“I’ve always had so many ideas about the narrative developments that one day I went to the writer to propose her a love story between Luna and the Headmaster … I told her I didn’t mind the difference of age between them, instead, I thought they would be a nice couple. She replied: ‘It’s not about the age. In any case, the relationship would be impossible because he is gay’. That’s how I found out about one of the greatest revelations of J.K. Rowling”

When asked about the decision to cast Noma Dumezweni in Cursed Child (which opens officially on July 30th), Evanna gave sensitive, thoughtful reasoning behind her answer:

“I consider it to be the right decision. Hermione is a libertarian in spirit, she fights for those in difficulty, it makes total sense to imagine her as part of a minority. One of the most beautiful things about J.K Rowling, which for me is a point of reference, is the way in which she uses her characters to send a message”.

She later reaffirmed this answer:

“Hermione’s feature is her desire to help the defenceless, like house-elves, thus it makes perfectly sense her being part of a minority. Such a choice proves that J.K. Rowling wished to give a strong social message through her work. As far as I’m concerned, it’s talent that counts, not skin colour”.

She also had a few words to say about Luna’s sense of social justice:

 “Luna doesn’t give a darn about people’s prejudices, she is a free spirit and she also helped me fighting my insecurities, just like she’s doing with million people in the world. This is the reason why I decided to embrace important causes in my following projects. For example, I acted a wicked girl who hates homosexuals in G.B.F. Because I felt awkward whilst giving life to her pettiness, I understood that my character would have succeeded in proving the premises of the film true.”

Evanna is an aspirational young actress, who likes to take on challenging roles – her troubled character in My Name is Emily illustrates her desire to portray complex characters who tell a story. However, she also sets herself personal challenges in her career:

“I always look for new challenges and I’ve got a long list of actors I’d like to play with. First of all is Benedict Cumberbatch because I’m a fan of his TV Sherlock”

Of course, as a Potter fan herself, Evanna would never give up another chance to play Luna:

“I am not ready to abandon the character entirely and I think I would be jealous if it were assigned to someone else”.

Later she also said of Cursed Child:

“ Should anyone make a film based on the stage play I would whip into it. The truth is that I can’t say goodbye to my character, and I hope to play it again, maybe in an older version”. 

We all know that Evanna loves her cat – her Instagram is almost exclusively photos/videos of Puff, so when a fan awkwardly proposed to her at the event, her reply was believable:

“We’ll talk about it again in ten years’ time, now I’m giving all my time over my kitties, indeed, I wish to open a cattery very soon to welcome them all and spend all my money on their safeguard”

Back with ma baby. Surely I’m not the only one who sings the Tangled wake up song to herself and her cat in the morning?? ????

A video posted by Evanna Lynch (@msevylynch) on Jul 8, 2016 at 11:42am PDT

I swear to god she talks to me and I understand her!! ???? #soulmates #bff #LilPuff

A video posted by Evanna Lynch (@msevylynch) on Jun 25, 2016 at 6:40pm PDT

Lynch also advised young aspiring actors to “read a lot and broadly, stay pure and be yourselves; this will help you in a world that is not always easy”.

She also gave advice to younger fans in the audience:

“Be sympathetic to your parents, explain them your dreams and help them understanding the reasons why you want to experience new things. Sometimes, they might forbid you to dye your hair or wear some clothes but they do it in good faith to protect you. My mother, who is here with me in the hall at Giffoni, gave me strict rules but she also left me free to find my way, so I realised that my adolescence rebellion was not a pique but instead a desire to understand who I was”

Read more over at the Giffoni Film Festival website and ANSA, and see photos of Evanna at the event below!

After portraying Dean Thomas in the Harry Potter films, Alfred Enoch has been starring in US drama How to Get Away With Murder, and is currently taking a break from TV to play Edmund in a filmed, critically-acclaimed theatrical production of Shakespeare’s King Lear, which will also star Don Warrington.

Huffington Post took some time to catch up with Enoch as part of their Wise Words interview series:

When and where are you happiest?
Working. Theatre, particularly, being on stage. Not that I like it more than TV, but the release of being on stage is very exciting to me. There comes a point when you go on and it’s beyond any rehearsal or correction, you just have to commit. When you’re in the wings, and you have to go on, it can be very freeing, but you have to trust that you’ve done enough work. I find that exhilarating.

What would you tell your 13-year-old self?
Rejoice. Don’t worry about it. It doesn’t matter that much. Throw yourself into it, and don’t check yourself.

What 3 things are at the top of your bucket list?
Go for a really long walk, Camino Del Santiago or something that big.
Do more plays.
Go back to Brazil.

What was the last good deed or act of kindness you received?
We’re about to start shooting the next season of this TV show ‘How to Get Away With Murder’, and everyone is so enthused to see each other. I’ve been in a different continent, other people have been travelling for work, scattered to the winds and now we return. There’s a lot of warmth when everyone gets back together.

Alfred also spoke about his wider beliefs – what happens when we die, good advice to live by, and occasions when he’s felt like we might live ‘in the presence of something bigger than ourselves':

“I love walking in London, and architecture is a big thing for me. I like the idea of the past happening in a certain place, I find it elusive and I love to try to bridge that gap between then and now. It can be a city, or equally the wilderness, but it can have that same feeling. In Malibu a while ago, I went for a walk with my parents, the sun was setting, and it just felt… immense.

Equally, I felt like that doing ‘Lear’ at the Royal Exchange. It’s a fantastic theatre, it has this dome and we used to come down from the dressing room, full of excitement and adrenalin, about to open a show, after all the work. I remember coming down the first few shows, looking up at glass dome which hangs over the theatre module, and feeling the wonder.”

Enoch’s appearance in King Lear: The Film will be available on demand in the UK and internationally for three months here. The film is a Talawa Theatre Company, Royal Exchange Theatre and Saffron Cherry TV production, in association with Lion Eyes TV and commissioned by The Space.

Royal Exchange Theatre gives more details:

“Captured at the Royal Exchange Theatre in May 2016, King Lear played to sell out theatre crowds during its run, winning 4 and 5 star reviews across the board and was described by the Guardian as ‘as close to definitive as can be’.

The original ‘intelligent and theatrical’ (Guardian) stage production was directed by Michael Buffong (A Raisin in the Sun, Moon on a Rainbow Shawl, All My Sons) and was a co-production between Talawa Theatre Company and the Royal Exchange Theatre in association with the Birmingham Repertory Theatre.”

Read more here, and watch a promo below!

During a recent Pottermore interview, Award winning actor Dan Fogler who plays Jacob Kowalski in “Fantastic Beasts” spoke about his admiration and respect for co star Alison Sudol.

Speaking of his fondness towards Alison, who effortlessly exudes glamour as the character Queenie, Fogler says “Alison is an angel. She’s an angel”.

“The moment I saw her, I knew her energy was just perfect. When she gets in the make-up and she’s Queenie and she’s got the lights on her, she’s got skin that glows, you know? When I saw her for the first time, I was like, holy…. It’s Alison Monroe over here – Marilyn’s cousin.”

“She has that feminine, delicate quality about her that also lends itself to comedy in an Audrey Hepburn kind of way.”

With No-Maj character Jacob and Queenie, (sister of Tina) sparking our attention as they become part of the prevailing foursome of the film, it is already very exciting to see their relationships develop both on and off screen.

Dan continues  ‘Together we’ve got a bit of an Adelaide and Nathan Detroit [from Guys and Dolls] thing going. So I’m always referencing something, that’s where I come from. I do a lot of homages in my work so I’m always referencing something. That’s what it feels like with the two of us.’

 “She’s the real professional, she’s a rock star.”

Just like Harry Potter, with those endearing relationships built from the start between the likes of Dan, Emma and Rupert, fans can expect a second istallation of charming, genuine chemistry and sparking friendships yet again within the 3 upcoming films. The combination of four protagonists this time shows us it’s definitely going to be a bumpy ride for Newt, and we can’t wait to see how the story pans out for him and his friends.

To read the full interview, visit Pottermore here!

“Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them” debuts November 18th.

Daniel Radcliffe shared his story of meeting Donald Trump on the Late Night With Seth Meyers before talking about his new off-Broadway play Privacy. 

Radcliffe tells that he met Trump while visiting New York City for the first time as an 11-year-old for an appearance on the Today Show. According to Radcliffe he was marched over to meet Trump and when the presumptive Republican presidential nominee asked how he was doing, Radcliffe told him that he was nervous about what to talk about in the show. Radcliffe states that Trump’s response was the following:

“You just tell them that you met Mr Trump!”

Radcliffe also talks about his new off-Broadway show Privacy, which is co-created and written by James Graham and Josie Rourke. According to Broadwayworld.com “Privacy is a timely exploration of the digital age that will feature a cast of seven, including Radcliffe as “The Writer.”” In addition to Radcliffe the cast includes De’Adre Aziza, Raffi Barsoumian, Michael Countryman, Rachel Dratch and Reg Rogers.

Broadwayworld.com writes:

“Inspired by the revelations of Edward Snowden, Privacy explores our complicated relationship with technology and data through the funny and heart-breaking travails of a lonely guy (Daniel Radcliffe), who arrives in the city to figure out how to like, tag, and share his life without giving it all away. The play uncovers what our technological choices reveal about who we are, what we want and who’s keeping track of it all. This provocative theatrical event will ask audiences to charge their phones, leave them ON during the performance and to embark on a fascinating dive online and into a new reality where we’re all connected…for better or worse.”

Privacy will begin previews for a limited engagement on July 5th in the Newman Theater. The official press opening of the play will be on Monday, July 18.

Throughout the books, Hermione was described to have big, bushy hair, large front teeth, and brown eyes. Those seem to be the only specific descriptions of her physical looks that we see. Her skin color was never specified. So, for those who read the books, she appeared differently in every mind.

For 10 years, Hermione was portrayed by Emma Watson. But now a new era of the Harry Potter world has arisen. With Harry Potter and the Cursed Child comes new actors playing characters we know and love. Unfortunately, some people are a little upset that they don’t all look the same.

Last year, the casting of Noma Dumezweni as our beloved Hermione Granger was announced. Most fans accepted the actresses skin colour, knowing full well that the characters skin was never specified. But there was that small group that fought back against the idea of a black Hermione.

Wednesday night, at the Oxford Union, Michael Gambon had some words for the critics of the decision to cast a black actress. Responding to a student who was curious to hear his opinion, he stated:

“It doesn’t matter what colour you are, does it? It doesn’t make a difference if you’re a black actress or a white actress. You’d forget it in five minutes, wouldn’t you? When the tabs go up on a play, and the person who’s in it starts talking, you soon forget about it. It doesn’t matter what colour they are, for God’s sake.”

He reacted very similarly to the notion that Idris Elba might take over the role of 007 once  Daniel Craig’s tenure has ended. “He’d be brilliant, wouldn’t he?” Gambon said of Elba. “If he goes and plays James Bond, he plays James Bond. That’s it, boom, stop.”

“It’s nonsense, isn’t it?” Expressed Gambon. “It’s so annoying. It’s a load of b****cks.”

Gambon also spoke about his role as Dumbledore – though he said he took on the position purely for the money, he’s always seemed to seemed to have a soft spot for the character:

“They rang me up and I jumped at it, I didn’t have to think at all,” he said of the first day on set as Dumbledore. “I turned up at the studio and did it – that’s all. 

“In my first entrance as Dumbledore I had to walk up some stairs and I ran up them. The director said you can’t run up them, and I said I want to run up them. And that was that.”

He also spoke about J.K. Rowling telling him that Dumbledore was in fact a gay character, and sang her praises:

“I think they made it up as they went along,” he chuckled. “She [J.K. Rowling] told me one day that Dumbledore was gay. She’d just decided that day. We’d been on for about three years!

“I started doing this on the set,” he grinned, playing with his hair and fluttering his eyelashes. “The director came running over to me and asked me what I was doing.

“I said that the women who wrote this play told me I was gay. He didn’t believe me, but she was there, and he went and asked her about it.

I didn’t play ‘gay’, I just played who I am.” 

“I think she’s brilliant … the stuff she writes is really clever.”

Read more on Michael Gambon at the Oxford Union here.

Throughout the books, Hermione was described to have big, bushy hair, large front teeth, and brown eyes. Those seem to be the only specific descriptions of her physical looks that we see. Her skin color was never specified. So, for those who read the books, she appeared differently in every mind.

For 10 years, Hermione was portrayed by Emma Watson. But now a new era of the Harry Potter world has arisen. With Harry Potter and the Cursed Child comes new actors playing characters we know and love. Unfortunately, some people are a little upset that they don’t all look the same.

Last year, the casting of Noma Dumezweni as our beloved Hermione Granger was announced. Most fans accepted the actresses skin colour, knowing full well that the characters skin was never specified. But there was that small group that fought back against the idea of a black Hermione.

Wednesday night, at the Oxford Union, Michael Gambon had some words for the critics of the decision to cast a black actress. Responding to a student who was curious to hear his opinion, he stated:

“It doesn’t matter what colour you are, does it? It doesn’t make a difference if you’re a black actress or a white actress. You’d forget it in five minutes, wouldn’t you? When the tabs go up on a play, and the person who’s in it starts talking, you soon forget about it. It doesn’t matter what colour they are, for God’s sake.”

He reacted very similarly to the notion that Idris Elba might take over the role of 007 once  Daniel Craig’s tenure has ended. “He’d be brilliant, wouldn’t he?” Gambon said of Elba. “If he goes and plays James Bond, he plays James Bond. That’s it, boom, stop.”

“It’s nonsense, isn’t it?” Expressed Gambon. “It’s so annoying. It’s a load of b****cks.”

Gambon also spoke about his role as Dumbledore – though he said he took on the position purely for the money, he’s always seemed to seemed to have a soft spot for the character:

“They rang me up and I jumped at it, I didn’t have to think at all,” he said of the first day on set as Dumbledore. “I turned up at the studio and did it – that’s all. 

“In my first entrance as Dumbledore I had to walk up some stairs and I ran up them. The director said you can’t run up them, and I said I want to run up them. And that was that.”

He also spoke about J.K. Rowling telling him that Dumbledore was in fact a gay character, and sang her praises:

“I think they made it up as they went along,” he chuckled. “She [J.K. Rowling] told me one day that Dumbledore was gay. She’d just decided that day. We’d been on for about three years!

“I started doing this on the set,” he grinned, playing with his hair and fluttering his eyelashes. “The director came running over to me and asked me what I was doing.

“I said that the women who wrote this play told me I was gay. He didn’t believe me, but she was there, and he went and asked her about it.

I didn’t play ‘gay’, I just played who I am.” 

“I think she’s brilliant … the stuff she writes is really clever.”

Read more on Michael Gambon at the Oxford Union here.

With the first screenings beginning last night, Now You See Me 2 is now in theaters!

Daniel Radcliffe’s face graces our the big screen as he appears in the movie as Walter Mabry, a spoiled billionaire who kidnaps the Horseman (Jesse Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, Dave Franco, and Lizzy Caplan) and tricks then into committing a heist. The Horseman, however, have other plans. They come up with an elaborate stunt to expose Walter Mabry and clear their names.

Coming from a lifetime in the Harry Potter world, you’d think Daniel Radcliffe would know quite a bit about magic. Well, he reveals, in this USA Today article, that he isn’t as good as Harry was with magic tricks.

“The one thing I can kind of do is the bit I screw up in the first scene,” says Radcliffe, 26, flicking an imaginary card from one hand to the other. “I can actually do that, but then the one time I missed, I was like, ‘Ah, that’s definitely going to be the (take) they use.’ Failure is always funnier than success, particularly when it comes to this character.”

Daniel tells that to prepare to play a smart yet bratty young billionaire, he looked to his private school classmates as inspiration. He clarifies that, while a lot of good, perfectly nice people come out of private schools, occasionally there will be those who have a false sense of entitlement which causes them to be quite arrogant. “I saw him as a product of that environment,” says Daniel.

Playing Walter Mabry in this illusion themed sequel to the 2013 surprise hit gave Daniel Radcliffe a chance to not on play the villain for the first time but also to work with a line-up of A-list actors. Being able to work with Michael Caine was particularly gratifying for Daniel. “A long-held personal goal of mine,” Daniel says of Caine, who plays Walter’s father in the film. “Growing up in England, you hear Michael talked about so much, with such reverence. Knowing that I’d have significant scenes with him was amazing.”

See more about the film here. Be sure to catch the film in theaters everywhere and see the trailer below!

This past weekend, I had the pleasure of attending Dallas Comic Con. James and Oliver Phelps, or sometimes more well known as Fred and George Weasley, have attended Dallas Cons quite frequently in the past few years. Two years ago, I was actually fortunate enough to meet them. This year, however, I only got to see them from afar as they took the stage for a Q&A session. Along with their Q&A session, they had a couple photo ops and were out on the floor for autographs in their down time.

When I met James and Oliver, they were both very kind and inviting. I got a photo op and an autograph with them both. As the line in front of me progressed and I finally made it into the photo op room, I was struck by how happy they both looked. It was one of the very first times I got to meet people at Comic Con, back when I was still treating them like gods instead of humans and acted like the human disaster I am when I met them. Despite my awkwardness, they greeted me with grins and didn’t force me to be too sociable as they placed their arms around me and we took the photo. The autograph was much the same except I had a little more time to greet them and ask them how they liked Texas.

Here’s the aforementioned photo from two years ago:

This Con’s Q&A was particularly entertaining. The Phelps Twins are always entertaining. I was quite impressed by the fact that they chose to stand the entire time, I definitely do not have the energy to stand for 40 minutes while being interrogated by fans of varying degrees of craziness. No offense, I do believe I have quite a high degree of craziness myself.

They ran onstage after the interviewer announced them, greeting the cheering crowd, but then ran off again with a quick “hang on.” They came back a few seconds later, James wearing a Texas Rangers baseball cap and Oliver in a ridiculous cowboy hat. The crowd loved it.

As I mentioned before, James and Oliver are very polite people. Right off the bat, they thanked everyone for being so kind to them and pointed out how glad they were that no one had collapsed at their signing table yet.

Just to clarify for the crowd, the interviewer tried to name which twin was which, but he ended up getting them wrong the first time! To be honest, the only way I could tell is I knew that James was standing on the left and Oliver on the right…

Now, since it was a forty-minute long panel, I’m not going to write about the entire thing. I will, however, put the video that a friend of mine took at the end!

To start, I’d like to kill a rumor that circulates through the fandom quite a bit. “I heard that y’all would sometimes switch roles, sometimes, on set. I was wondering, what is the longest stretch of time that y’all went without getting caught.” This question has come up at both of their panels that I’ve been too. Sorry to burst your bubble, but they never switched roles. They knew that, if they had done, it would have taken a lot of time and money to refilm those scenes and they didn’t want to be a nuisance to the other people working on the film. They did admit to doing it during rehearsal though.

Fan questions at Q&A panels aren’t always the most entertaining. They can be very repetitive and, sometimes, a bit stupid. But occasionally you get that fan who has thought long and hard about their question before asking it, making sure it was unique and interesting.

“If you could do anything besides acting in the film industry, what would it be?” This is a question I had never heard before! And since I am a film student I was very curious to hear their answers. There are hundreds of people with hundreds of different jobs that work on a single movie. Cameramen, video editors, sound editors, directors and assistant directors, producers, etc. You have an encyclopedia of options for working in the film industry. James said that he’d want to be “Grip”, or a person who mounts and moves the camera on a track. Oliver, on the other hand, seemed quite content with acting, but did say he was interested in the makeup department.

“What one scene from the books do you wish they would have put in the movies?” As fans, we all have several different scenes from the books that we were quite upset weren’t put in the movies. Not only scenes, but characters as well. The actors had to put up with the differences without complaint but they must have had opinions too, right? Well, James and Oliver both agreed that they wanted the swamp scene from the fourth book to appear in the movie, but they knew there was a chance it wouldn’t show up.

“What was your favorite book and movie?” I always feel that a persons favorite Harry Potter installment can tell you a lot about their personality. That and I am a very nosy person and just like to know these things about people. James knew immediately that his favorite book was the Prisoner of Azkaban. He informed the crowd that it was the book he was reading when they were cast as the twins. He seemed to add as an after thought that his favorite film was the Goblet of Fire and Oliver picked it up there saying that was his favorite book. James and Oliver like to tease each other quite a bit, which is evident when Oliver informs the crowd that his favorite film is The Deathly Hallows Part 2.

I guess I should stop boring you with my perspective on their panel. But watch the video of the full thing below! You don’t want to miss any of their bickering or stories of pranks they pulled on and off set!

Harry Potter alum, Matthew Lewis (Neville Longbottom) recently sat down for a photoshoot with Interview Magazine. In this photo shoot, Matt kept all of his clothes on. He also discussed his life in the five years since the wrap up of the Harry Potter films.

Matt Lewis has covered a number of roles since his Longbottom days. He has taken on everything from romantic comedies and “chick flicks,” to sketchy characters in crime dramas. Matt explained to Interview Magazine how he came to take on such roles, saying:

“Some of the more interesting characters are the ones that aren’t heroic, that aren’t James Bond-esque,” Lewis explains over the phone. “I quite like the interesting ones, so I never really say, ‘I won’t do that, I won’t do this’ or ‘I want to do this or that.’ I like to keep an open mind… [I’m interested in] the idea of people wanting to discuss something that’s happened in their life or that’s impacted or changed them,” he continues.

“On the flip side of that, sometimes it’s nice to do something that’s fun, a movie where people are going to come in, and switch off for an hour and a half. I feel like if you can do one of those two things, if you can tell a great story that affects people or you can make them have fun, then you’re doing all right.”

Matt Lewis discussed how he took on the role of Patrick in the summer flick, Me Before You, and his darker character of Sean in the TV drama, Happy Valley.

On Patrick: “It was quite different. In the book, Patrick is a bit of a dick. He is obviously very focused on himself; he’s self-centered and won’t give a whole lot of time to Louisa’s needs, wants, and potential in life. We wanted to keep the inherent features of Patrick in the movie but we wanted to make it a little bit less black-and-white, a bit more ambiguous as to her ultimate decision. We wanted to see more of a reason why Louisa was with Patrick for the seven years…It can be a scary thing to suddenly leave your life behind and say, “I’m going to go and realize my full potential.” It can be quite daunting and we wanted to convey that.”

On Sean: “There were quite a few nerves involved with that for the few months of preparation for it. I just wanted to make sure that I did it justice.”

Then it was just the idea of trying to get into Sean’s mind. Luckily, for me, Sally understands her characters very well; she has vivid images of where they’ve come from, where they’re going, why they do what they do, etcetera. I had to pick at her brain and find Sean’s motivation, which was daunting for sure, but it all helped in trying to create this character—this young man who is very, very lost.

You don’t play him as the bad guy; you just play what’s on the page and you play his life, and his life was that he moved from town to town, no one had really ever given a shit about him, he’s got a very bad temper and often he regrets that. He drinks a lot and he can’t remember and it’s that frustration more than anything. The anger is a result of the frustration and once you realize that, the rest of it starts to fall into place.

In a flash back to when he was just 11 years old. Matt Lewis recounted his first day on set of the Harry Potter films. He discussed working with award-winning actors, such as Alan Rickman and Maggie Smith, but particularly recalling being in awe of Rik Mayall who was cast as Peeves, a role that didn’t make it past final edit cuts. Lewis talked about how Harry Potter changed how he approached acting, and took on different roles.

“I can remember quite clearly being 11 years old on the first one. We were at Alnwick Castle in Northumberland and it was the scene with Madam Hooch, where we have the broomstick lesson and Neville flies off and crashes into the wall…

“They looked after me very much and I had a week of my life just flying on this broomstick around this beautiful castle in the North of England. I thought, “If this is what my career is, if this is what I’m going to get paid to do for a living, then this is the dream.”

“I was sort of unaware of the caliber of who I was working with, but definitely their fame and their ability to a certain degree. There were a lot of things that those guys had been in and done that I was a huge fan of. At the time, I was a ridiculously big fan of Rik Mayall, who sadly passed away a couple of years ago. Rik was cast to play Peeves the Poltergeist in the first film, and unfortunately he was cut out in the end because of time issues, but he was superb in it.”

“I sat next to him at the read-through and I was completely lost for words. He really took me under his wing and started chatting me through the different characters behind the camera, who everybody was and what their job was, and he signed my script. It was a huge moment to be in that read-through surrounded by all of these amazing people who I’d seen on TV and then they were friendly and so unassuming.”

“Then the worst thing happens, you get to 15, 16 and start to realize, as you’ve already said, the sheer caliber of what they’ve done. You become much more aware of the craft and the medium. All of that camaraderie you’ve built up over the years suddenly takes a big hit because you go, “Oh god, I’ve been so blasé with these people. They’re actually all incredible and I’m just here chilling out with them.” So then you get a whole new fear that comes along. I was 18 when I finally got over that.”

When moving forward from the Harry Potter films, and looking to be recognized in other roles, Matt Lewis expresses the same catch-22 of the other Harry Potter “child stars”–eternal gratefulness that Harry Potter was their start, but seeking to break the labels of their Harry Potter characters and gain recognition for their acting abilities in other roles. Matt Lewis stated:

“It was an exciting time and quite strange [having done] them for 10 years but I was very ready to finish when we came to the last one. After playing the character for that amount of time, I wanted to do different things, I wanted to find new characters, and explore new avenues. I literally had no idea what I was going on to…”

“I wasn’t keen to jump back into a robe and be a wizard in something anytime soon but [I was interested in] anything that came up, really. I felt very much that I was starting at the bottom rung again and that being in Harry Potter was no gimmick; I was going to have to leave that behind to lose the Neville Longbottom tag and prove that I could do other things, learn, and understand.”

The article continues as Matt discussed growing up in Leeds, acting with his brother Anthony, hoping to work with his brother Chris, almost getting trampled to death by cows with his Me Before You costars, and much more. The entire article may be read here, accompanied by a gallery of pictures from the photo shoot.

Pottermore recently interviewed Matthew Lewis, Rupert Grint and Bonnie Wright, following up each interview with a sorting.

So far, the only actor to be sorted into their character’s Hogwarts house was Bonnie Wright, who matched Ginny Weasley’s Gryffindor traits.

Evanna Lynch was also invited to speak to Pottermore about what the series means to her, and as a fan of the Harry Potter book before she got the part as the bold, eccentric and loving character of Luna Lovegood, Evanna clearly had a special place in her heart for the books:

‘They just feel so much like friends for me, in a way that other books don’t. Other books feel like I’m getting a little peek into your life, but somehow, just the way Jo writes them, they just feel like friends.’

She also says that growing up with the books is a big part of why older generations still seek refuge in the books.

Of course, Evanna says she misses playing Luna Lovegood, but says that she still feels connected to the character:

“I feel like I can still call on her inspiration and spirit when I need to” 

Her favourite scene to film was Fleur and Bill’s wedding in Deathly Hallows, due to being able to meet the character of Luna’s father, Xenophilus Lovegood.

When it comes to being sorted, Evanna wastes no time being sentimental about Ravenclaw. She is promptly sorted into Gryffindor, and gives a triumphant grin, proudly showing off the result.

On how she feels about the sorting:

“Thrilled, but also, not surprised”

Watch the full video below, along with a compilation video of all the sortings thus far!

Fair or not, the sorting quiz created by Pottermore is nothing if not in depth in an odd sort of way. Matthew Lewis who marvelously portrayed the often clumsy, but always-there-when-you-needed-him, Neville Longbottom, a Gryffindor, took J.K. Rowling’s sorting quiz today.

Watch as he gets a taste of this first hand when he sat down with Pottermore recently to discover his house. Unlike yesterday’s Bonnie Wright video, or Mondays Rupert Grint interview, this was less of a question and answer and more of a let’s just watch Matthew Lewis neurotically answer these questions.

It does seem, however that as more of the younger cast sits down to be sorted, the Hufflepuff’s have grabbed themselves some real big names. Gone, it would seem, are the days of Cedric Diggory being the best Hufflepuff.

Could the Hufflepuffs take one more star tomorrow? Be sure to check in and see if Evanna Lynch gets to follow Luna in the Ravenclaw house.

Helena Bonham Carter has always been one to take on more anomalous roles in her acting career. The Red Queen definitely does not differ from this pattern. With her abnormally large head and a tendency to order beheadings onto others, the role is one that Helena enjoys quite a bit.

She gave a interview with Den of Geek this week, telling us a little about her return to the role in Alice Through the Looking Glass. While the first movie, Alice in Wonderland, had little focus on Helena’s character, this one will not only show her more in present time but also give us a peak into her past.

And then when the sequel came around, I was just praying it was well-written. And it was. And in a sort of typically Red Queen egocentric way, I thought, “Oh, there’s a lot about me!” [laughs] And it all made sense. And there was lots of things to develop. So it was fun, because she wasn’t necessarily a big part in the first one. So it was nice to have something where you develop something and you work on something quite a lot. And I seriously do…I’m anal about my craft.

Helena Bonham Carter is no doubt one of those actresses who puts everything she can into a role, finding ways to better relate to her characters. She tells that she did a bit of research, using the Alice books, on her character. She seems to understand Iracebeth and her childish anger, “…I thought, “Well, she’s got too big a head.” So everybody’s head that was normal size was always a reminder that hers was abnormal. So that’s why she had to cut everybody else’s head off.”

Another face, or voice rather, from Harry Potter will appear in the film. Alice Through the Looking Glass, which is dedicated to him, is said to be Alan Rickman’s last film. Helena and Alan have worked closely many times before and she had a few words of consolation for those still mourning his passing:

Well, the poetic thing about it is he’s voicing a blue butterfly. And anything that I can tell Rima, his wife, to comfort her, is there’s that quote: “Just when the caterpillar thought it was all over, it became a butterfly.” And often, butterflies…you know, death can be seen as the end. It can also…I don’t know if it’s any comfort, but you can also see that it’s a point of transition.

Give me a moment to wipe my tears…

Wow, okay. On that note, see the rest of the interview here and be sure to get tickets to see Helena Bonham Carter in Alice Through the Looking Glass which comes out this Friday!

Bustle recently sat down with Christian Coulson, to discuss his portrayal of young Tom Riddle in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

Coulson revealed that he could empathise with his character relatively easily (minus the genocidal, racist tendencies, of course). Raised in Wool’s Orphanage in London, Tom Riddle was a troubled, isolated, child – Coulson says his experience of boarding school helped him empathise with Riddle’s isolation, but also to his slightly darker side:

“I had been at boarding school in a sort of Hogwarts-y school called Westminster, which has been around for about 1000 years … The stone steps leading up to where we had assembly are worn down from hundreds of years boys running up and down them. My parents were abroad when I was there, and I felt like I was an orphan. There was a detached survival mechanism that I really identified with.”

 “I really loved doing that scene with Richard Harris where I’m pretending to be a model student… while really lying to him,” Coulson says. “It reminded me a lot of my experience at boarding school — of being impeccably well-behaved on the outside and secretly getting up to mischief.”

“There’s a lot that isn’t similar about us, but I felt that I understood something about him.There’s something very wrong with him, but I understand what it is,” the 37-year-old actor says. “The things he did [as a teenager] made sense to me in terms of his survival.”

Portraying Riddle at a time when Rowling was still developing his story arc, Coulson enjoyed imagining the depth to his character:

 “From the information in those [four books], it seemed to me that there was a coldness and an emotional absence to his evil, and that was what I was interested in exploring.”

Riddle’s story begins in 1926 – the year Newt Scamander arrived at MACUSA with his magnificent briefcase after being expelled from Hogwarts, and supported by Albus Dumbledore himself. An interesting coincidence, making us wonder if there’s any chance we’ll be getting hints at the dark lord in Fantastic Beasts… or is it too early in Riddle’s life to pull him into the story?

Read the full Bustle interview here.

Since the release of the newest, full-length Fantastic Beasts trailer, the Fantastic Beasts cast and Warner Bros have started their journey on the promotional trail for the film. Recently, WB attended CinemaCon in Las Vegas, accompanied by actors and actresses from the various films they presented and intend on releasing in the next year or two.

Eddie Redmayne, Colin Farrell, Alyson Sudol, and Dan Fogler took the stage to present Fantastic Beasts with WB. Though the event is closed, and the behind the scenes material shown has not been released to the public, red carpet interviews with the cast are giving fans a little more insight. This recent interview of Dan Fogler (towards the end of the video) is more intriguing than most:

Dan Fogler seems to be implying that we will see (and possibly meet?) the younger versions of familiar Harry Potter characters. As most know, Fogler can be a bit of a jokester. Is he messing with Harry Potter fans or is his excitement real? His co-star, Alyson Sudol seem reassured that the world of Fantastic Beasts was pretty independent of that of Harry’s time at Hogwarts. But Dan Fogler’s excitement just seems too real! He pleads the 5th! Why?

We can’t wait to find out. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them hits theaters November 18, 2016.

The ever-mysterious Pottermore Correspondent managed to sneak in an interview with Katherine Waterston, on the set of Fantastic Beasts. She ‘perfectly inhabits’ the character of Tina Goldstein, according to Pottermore, and we can’t wait to see for ourselves the level of talent David Yates clearly saw in her:

‘We were standing in the pouring rain with David Yates and I asked him about the casting process,’ I [the Pottermore Correspondent] tell Katherine, wondering if she knows. ‘David said he got Eddie Redmayne to read with so many actresses but he knew immediately that you were Tina. That you had such perfect chemistry and it had to be you.’

‘Oh! Oh, really?’ she says, genuinely incredulous and in her soft American accent. ‘That’s too nice. I bet he was like, “Don’t tell her that, it’ll go to her head!” Oh, he’s such a dear man. He brings so much joy to the set, but the real thing that trickles down from the top is his faith in this process because he’s been in this world before.’

Yates has also been at work on The Legend of Tarzan, and knows the Potter series well after directing the last four movies, so he is well versed in leading great actors – we’re confident he’s found something special in Waterston!

Katherine says that Yates has been a huge help on set, and clearly has a passion for his work and J.K. Rowling’s world:

‘Usually on a movie, you’re going into new territory together and you’re like, “Is there quicksand around the corner, are there going to be wolves attacking?” Whereas David’s been here before so he’s just like, “You’re going to take a left here and avoid the quicksand”. 

‘He has a shorthand and a comfort with the world. He’s not precious with it, he understands what it needs and what it doesn’t need and there’s something really comforting in that.’

 ‘When we’re incorporating things that aren’t actually there, to look at David and know he can see the world is… everything,’

‘It’s sort of like when your parents read you a book when you’re a kid; if they read it with passion and curiosity, you can see the whole world.’

When asked by the Pottermore correspondent what she thinks of Rowling’s world, and how she feels about the script, Katherine gives us some great insight on the film’s tone. ‘Tender’, ‘slightly English’ and ‘beautiful’, but more interestingly, the film is reportedly ‘rooted in truth':

‘Ah, this movie. It’s so clever and it’s rooted in truth. It’s got light, funny elements and then much darker, more adult elements. I normally don’t respond so well to innocent lovely things, I think, “come on, let’s get on with it”. But there’s something about this script and the way J.K. Rowling writes; it’s tender without being saccharine. It never lingers on the sweet parts but maybe that’s a slightly English thing: “Oh I felt something – moving on!” No, really, it’s a beautiful film. It’ll kill me to finish filming it.’

Read the full interview with Katherine Waterston over at Pottermore here.

Following the exciting release of another amazing Fantastic Beasts trailer at the MTV Movie Awards yesterday evening (which you can read about here and watch below), Pottermore caught an exclusive interview with Eddie Redmayne himself – and it’s just about the loveliest interview you’ll ever read!

As we know, Fantastic Beasts will be dealing with a very different setting to that of the Harry Potter series. Tom Riddle is just being born (in 1926), Albus Dumbledore is still teaching Transfiguration at Hogwarts (and apparently advocating against Newt’s expulsion), and we’re being wooshed away to New York, to see how the American wizarding (and No-Maj) world of the 1920’s differs from the British version of the 1990’s-2000’s.

Talking about the pressure of adding to the legacy of Potter, and helping to create this entirely new story, Eddie remains humble as ever, showing how much he cares about the series and his character:

“‘Each time you put a little thing like that out into the world, it feels nerve-wracking,’ he says, in his reverent British half-whisper. ‘The weird thing about film-making is that you make films as a team and together, you care about every bit that goes out. You care what people think. I care.’ 

Eddie blinks a couple of times, earnestly, and it’s clear that he does. He’s the kind of actor who keeps a piece of his characters in his heart. He adores Newt Scamander especially, you can tell.

‘When I first heard the notion of this film and that it was set in a totally different time period [to Harry Potter] the question for me was, would those worlds ever collide? When I read the script, the delicacy with which J.K. Rowling weaves the names and the characters of a different generation to the one we know and love excited me. It still does.’

As for Newt’s expulsion and the reason he’s arrived in New York City? 

‘I can say nothing further about that,’ Eddie says, holding tight onto the secret. “

You can tell Eddie really knows his stuff – we love an actor who gets into the story as much as us (we’re looking at you, Evanna Lynch)!

On Newt’s love for magi-zoology:

‘Newt is much better at communicating with beasts and spending time with his creatures than perhaps he is with human interaction. On the journey of this film, he begins to find connections with people but he’s not exactly a people-pleaser. What I love about Newt Scamander is that he’s his own person. He’s a passionate man and he’ll do anything for those beasts.’

Our frame-by-frame analysis of the trailer gives a closer look at one of the more adorable beasts in Newt’s intriguing briefcase, and allows us to see that the briefcase holds beastie characters we’ll get to know more throughout the film. The mysterious Pottermore Correspondent chooses to focus on this strange (but cute!) little beast:

‘The Niffler!’ says Eddie, with a slight shake of his fist on Newt’s behalf. ‘As you know, I have a love-hate relationship with that little guy. He gets a little moment in the trailer, the Niffler. He’s ravaging a purse. I thought he did pretty immaculately in his debut but there’s a lot more Niffler to come. He looked so sweet and adorable just then but don’t be fooled.’

Eddie beams with genuine affection for the little beast and sighs with relief that he can finally talk about a few more things that appear in the film. Now that the trailer’s out, he’s got approximately eight fewer secrets to keep until November. 

‘I’m so bad at keeping secrets, so anything being out there that I don’t have to hide anymore is good,’ he says.

We know that Eddie’s a busy man, and we also know that he’s expecting a baby with his wife – apparently he’s taking a well-deserved break (but probably not for long – the sequel’s still to come, and another after that!):

‘Do you know, I am actually taking a wee break,’ he says. ‘My wife is having a baby and we thought we’d travel a little. What was wonderful about Fantastic Beasts is that it was fully immersive but the shoot was long, it was six months and it was rigorous. I put everything I had into it so, yeah, it’s time for a wee break.’

But one of the best parts of the interview doesn’t even involve any interviewing – the Pottermore Correspondent beautifully sums up Eddie’s shining personality with a quick observation, making us even more confident that he’s the Newt we never knew we were looking for:

“And with that, Eddie stands, hugs me goodnight, climbs the narrow black stairs down from his trailer, stops to film 11 seconds of fireworks on his phone and jumps into the black car waiting for him outside.”

Read the full interview over at Pottermore here!

We can’t wait to see/hear more about the film (which hits cinemas November 18th!) – catch the trailer below, and read our frame by frame analysis here!

Adding to the torrent of great interviews from the grand opening of The Wizarding World of Harry Potter in Hollywood this week, SnitchSeeker have posted interviews with Tom Felton and Warwick Davis,  on which attraction they think should be added to the park.

Tom Felton stayed loyal to his character, saying he’d love to see Malfoy Manor, and even said he’d agree if he was asked to be involved in the process of making it!:

“I would like to see Malfoy Manor – obviously a bit biased there. I think it would maybe make a good ghost house or some sort of like spook train or whatever. There’s enough dark sides of that house to scare any child, I think. Yeah, there’s more look forward to. Something tells me this isn’t the end of it.”

On Fantastic Beasts, Tom Felton was confident that the newest venture in the cinematic Wizarding World will live up to Potter fans’ standards:
SnitchSeeker: What are your thoughts about the Fantastic Beasts series? What are you hoping to see, as a fan, as part of the series?
Tom: No expectations. I haven’t thought about it. I know it’s the dream team. You’ve got Heyman, Yates and Rowling back together, so they can’t really do much wrong, I don’t think. I have every faith in their ability to convert Jo’s work to the best of their abilities. I just think it’s exciting that she’s keeping the flame going, in a different sense. She’s creating more content.

SnitchSeeker: What would be your advice to that cast, just coming into this fan base, for Eddie Redmayne and everybody else?
Tom: I don’t think they need to take advice from us. We don’t share any similarities, really. At 9 and 10 years old, we had no idea what we were getting ourselves into. They know exactly what they’re getting themselves into. And Eddie’s an Oscar-winning actor. The last thing he needs is advice from me.

Tom also spoke about his career choices, and projects he’s currently involved in:

SnitchSeeker: What do you have coming up, project-wise?
Tom: Something released? A few things this year. There’s an animation film called, Sheep & Wolves, there’s a British spy film called, Stratton and a film that I just did with Troian Bellisario, an American drama called, Feed. I have no idea when any of these films will be out, but I know they will be at some point. This year’s going to be mostly commercial.

SnitchSeeker: You pick so many different projects. How do you choose them? What motivates you?
Tom: Just people. I don’t particularly go for character or story. I mean, it all plays a part, but I’m more interested in working with people that I get on well with. I don’t consider the outcome to be the reward or the result. I just purely base it on my experience, and what comes out of it is really neither here nor there to me. If the Harry Potter films were a complete failure, I still would have loved them as much as I did. So yeah, just enjoying the experience.

Watch SnitchSeeker’s video of the interview below, and read the full interview here.

Warwick Davis also told us what he’d add – he takes a dark route, similar to Tom – it’d definitely be interesting to see some sort of haunted mansion-esque ride with the darker places in the Wizarding World featuring somehow!:

SnitchSeeker: If you had a voice in how to expand the Wizarding World here or in Orlando or even Japan, what would you like to see come to life?
Warwick: I would like to see Azkaban. I’m intrigued about what goes on in Azkaban. We hear about it but we never really get a chance to see in Azkaban. So I think that’d be interesting.

SnitchSeeker: How would you envision it?
Warwick: A dark experience, wouldn’t it be? It’d be spooky, kind of like a Haunted Mansion-type thing that they have at Disneyworld. You go through and it’s one of those exploratory rides that takes you through. Lots of shocks and stuff, and really into special effects.

Speaking on Fantastic Beasts and Cursed Child (which Warwick admitted he’d love to have a part in),  Davis seems just as excited as Tom, with all the trust in Jo Rowling and Jack Thorne to give us amazing stories, and links this to the abilities of the theme park to add to the Potter stories in ways we’d never imagined:

SnitchSeeker: So Fantastic Beasts and Cursed Child, it’s basically a new chapter in the entire Wizarding World. What are your thoughts on it – starting with Fantastic Beasts?
Warwick: Fantastic Beasts will, I believe, give us another glimpse into the Wizarding World J.K. Rowling’s imagined. That’s quite exciting, isn’t it? It’ll be a slightly different perspective of that world. I’m looking forward to seeing the movie.

SnitchSeeker: Have you poked J.K. Rowling to get her rolling there? Because we know there are goblins in Fantastic Beasts?
Warwick: You don’t know who to drop hints to, these days. I used to do that with Star Wars. That was my old trick. If there’s a character, I would hope that they would ask me to do something. As I said, I’m just excited that they’re actually going to make some more stuff that gives us another look into that world. 

As do things here in the Wizarding World. Forbidden Journey is a chance to experience further adventures – something you don’t see in the movies. So all of this stuff expands on it. The play in London will also do a little bit more of that, as well. It’ll be a slightly different glimpse into the world.

SnitchSeeker: So what advice would you give to the actors in Fantastic Beasts, as somebody whose been surrounded by millions of fans over the years? They’re about to hit that, as well.
Warwick: They’re certainly going to find it an interesting experience. And one I should imagine they’re preparing themselves for because, obviously, when we made the first Harry Potter film we knew the books were really successful, there were two books out at that point. 

We never had a concept of how successful the movie was going to be. And then the fact that we were going to go and make eight in total. So at this point I imagine they actually have some idea like, “Yeah, this could be pretty huge, this.” But, you never can tell, but they’re always going to be known for being cast members in Fantastic Beasts. That’s what’s going to happen.

In terms of projects he’s working on, Warwick is very secretive – SnitchSeeker try to get us some hints, but to no avail, unfortunately! We look forward to the eventual revealing of his role in films to come:

SnitchSeeker: So what’s coming up for you, project-wise?
Warwick: I’m in loads of stuff at the minute. Much of it I can’t talk about, which is a shame, but rules of secrecy exist quite prominently in the film industry now. There’s lots of exciting things, but stuff I can’t talk about. Sorry.

SnitchSeeker: Possibly back in Star Wars?
Warwick: Again, I couldn’t talk about it.

Again, see SnitchSeeker’s interview with Warwick below, and read the full interview with him here.

Catch more with Tom, Warwick and other Potter actors from the event here and here!

The red carpet event celebrating yesterday’s grand opening of The Wizarding World of Harry Potter in Hollywood took place on the 5th April.  Leaky fans were on the ground covering the event, which you can read about here, but of course there are more interviews with the Potter cast than we can count!

Here are some of the best below:

Entertainment Weekly sought after the actor’s questions for J.K. Rowling since the series finished filming.

James and Oliver Phelps wanted to know what happened to George after Fred’s death:

OLIVER: I think with George, it would probably be what does he do with the company. Like, does he expand it? Or does he just keep it as homage to his brother? Or does he go, we’re going to open it up elsewhere?

JAMES: Did he franchise it?

Oliver Phelps came up with a great theory regarding Fred’s ultimate fate, which he told Seventeen:

“I think he’d dive into the family business even more and try to make it even better in Fred’s memory, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Fred was a ghost in the shop.”

Tom Felton told Entertainment Weekly that he missed Draco, and had endless compliments for J.K. Rowling regarding the character:

“There’s a beautiful understanding between him and I, I think. I miss him. I miss him a lot. But Jo has such a wonderful way of making these characters so rich and full anyway. I suppose all the things that I don’t know are assumed. But I also know that Jo is an endless wealth of knowledge so if I ever have anything that was puzzling me, I know she’d be more than happy for me to ask her. You’ve got me picking my brains now. I’ll have to message her tomorrow.”

Evanna Lynch obviously had the most questions about Luna – being a huge fan of the books, she wanted to know more about Luna’s family:

“I think the big blank is her mom. I’ve always wondered what she’s like. We’ve just been told her name is Pandora and that she died doing an experiment, and I just wonder, I really am curious what was her relationship with Luna? Because obviously she’s so close to her dad, and I find that there’s always one parent that you have more in common with or that you confide in more, and I wonder … was that her mom? Or just what kind of person she was.”

Make sure you catch the full article from Entertainment Weekly here.

You can also read a hilarious exclusive interview with Tom Felton playing ‘Marry, Snog, Stupefy’ with Bustle here, and a snippet from the interview below:

“When given three names of Harry Potter characters, Felton must choose which he’d most like to marry, snog (kiss), and stupefy, which, according to Harry Potter wiki, to stupefy someone means to “render a victim unconscious and/or halt moving objects.” So basically, it’s a less morbid version of the “kill” option most muggles are accustom to.

But before I can give him three options, Felton declares: “I’d snog Bellatrix.” …. I remind him of the rules — I give you the three options, Tom — and we begin.”

MSN also spoke to Evanna Lynch, about the roles she is currently looking for, which appear to steer away from ‘darker’ roles in shows such as The Walking Dead:

“I really just want to do characters a I really love,” Lynch told AAP on the red carpet at the grand opening of the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios in California.

“There are other scripts that come along and I see them but I don’t really have the passion unless I connect with the character.

“I am sick of zombie movies, all these things about undead people. I want things that make the world lighter rather than scarier.

“Everyone says it’s so good but I hate zombies and that kind of violence.”

She also commented on J.K. Rowling’s constant development of the wizarding world – which we know she is excited about and understandably wanting to be involved in! Evanna spoke about what she’d like to see from any sequels involving Luna:

“She (Rowling) has created another world and made it so rich and varied and interesting and I feel like it will never end,” Lynch said.

“I’d love if she did a sequel, I would love to know more about Luna and I feel like there is a lot more to explore.

“I would love a wildlife show with Luna and a documentary series.”

Read the MSN interview in full here.

She revealed her thoughts on whether she thought the pairing of Neville and Luna should have gone any further to Movie Pilot:

“Definitely not. I think he’s very much a homebody, a stay-at-home dad. And Luna wants to go out and explore the world and different creatures, and I think she wants to have several different relationships and not be committed forever. Neville would want a good sturdy wife who cooks, and that’s not her.”

Evanna also gave Extra a VIP tour along with James and Oliver Phelps, which you can view below:

Warwick Davis also attended the event, and spoke to Hollywood Life about the how he’d feel about appearing in Cursed Child. Of course, he’d be more than thrilled:

“To be back in something that has been created by J.K. Rowling and something that goes on to have a life beyond that is exceptional and it would be lovely to do that!”

“I love performing, I am an actor. This is what I love doing So however I manage that and have that manifest itself is a great pleasure!”

He also revealed his aspirations for TV:

“It would be to have a chat show, I mean that is my last bucket list to take on”

“I have done everything else in my career that I have wanted to take on and what I want to do but the chat show still remains elusively something that I would still love to do and a thing that I think I could do very well!”

Read the full interview at Hollywood Life here.

SnitchSeeker also caught up with James and Oliver Phelps to ask them about the theme parks, and about the newest ventures into the wizarding world (Fantastic Beasts and Cursed Child). They posted a video of the interview (below), and you can catch their transcript here.

Make sure you catch our full coverage of the event at this link!

It looks like David Tennant agrees with Albus Dumbledore. The Radio Times caught Tennant and his Doctor Who co-star Billie Piper’s comments on J.K. Rowling’s Wizarding World at an event earlier this week.

Both Doctor Who stars are Harry Potter fans, as expected. Both of them sorted themselves into Slytherin–coming from Barty Crouch Jr., who is surprised?–without taking any quizzes. Tennant also questioned the whole sorting deal in general, finding it a quirk in J.K. Rowling’s world building.

The Radio Times reports Tennant saying:

“I’ve always found that a bit odd. You turn up, think you’re an easy going, happy-go-lucky kid and then on the first day they go, ‘No, you’re a baddie, you’re in Slytherin!’

“As a child psychologist, I don’t think it’s great,” he added with a laugh. “People develop at different stages. I think you should be allowed to get through puberty before you’re condemned to a life on the dark side.”

The original article may be read here.

After being interviewed by Esquire prior to the release of the magazine’s Men and Women issue for April 2016, Emma Watson has interviewed Tom Hanks (who features alongside her on the cover) on films, family and feminism.

Starring in The Circle together, Hanks and Watson make a great duo, and their talk about the HeForShe campaign is enlightening and shows just how needed the campaign is.

Emma Watson: Are you a feminist?

Tom Hanks: Yes I am. We are in the Third Millennium. We have thousands of years of human history under our belts. If we are not continuously moving towards equal rights, equal opportunities and equal freedoms for every member of the human race — not just that half that is male — then we have squandered all we have learned.

On  gender equality and listening to women:

“The women I have worked with and those I seek inspiration from have had different perspectives on all there is to have an opinion on in this world, and I have always learned from listening to them. My support of those women and those in my family has been the same as it has for any man or any of my sons.”

On gender binaries, sexuality, love and why inclusivity is so important:

EW: You have been very supportive of same-sex marriage. I spoke a lot in my speech to the UN about the importance of seeing gender on a spectrum instead of as binary, and being inclusive of where everyone fits on that spectrum. Would this be something you would like to speak about? Is there a connection there?

TH: Look at us human beings! Each of our fingerprints is unique. Our eyes are just as varied. Just as no two snowflakes are the same, neither are we. We are as singular as those lines and ridges on our palms and fingers. Our gender is defined the same way. We love who we love, we are passionate for those who stir us. The directions our love takes us in are infinite. Not just two boxes marked EITHER and OR.

On why he supports the HeForShe campaign (aw):

EW: Why did you agree to support the HeForShe campaign by appearing on the cover of Esquire?

TH: I find Emma Watson as fascinating as she is accomplished. Time spent with someone as dedicated and as smart as she is is time well spent. 

The final question related to Emma Watson’s own interview with Esquire, and her answer about unequal treatment of women in the film industry. Hanks gives an eloquent and balanced response:

EW: You are no stranger to working with strong women. One of your most famous films, Big, was directed by Penny Marshall and you starred in A League of Their Own alongside Geena Davis, who founded the Geena Davis Institute to campaign for gender equality in film. But Hollywood is far from equal, on screen and off. Of the top films in 2013, women accounted for only 30 per cent of all speaking characters. Female characters are almost four times as likely as males to be shown in sexy attire in G-rated [family] films. Or look at the Oscars. The LA Times reports that Academy voters are 76 per cent male, 93 per cent white, with an average age of 63. Kathryn Bigelow is the only woman to win the Oscar for Best Director. No woman of colour has ever been nominated. Why does this matter?

TH: Because the art form of cinema becomes less of an art, and no longer holds the mirror up to nature when women are reduced to being only hot or nurturing. The great films make us all recognise ourselves up there on the screen, even when the characters are women from a different time and maybe speak a different language. When rules of gender and character dictate what stories are told and by whom, when women are required to be only hot or only nurturing, they no longer are full dimensional humans. That’s not art, and it brings less enlightenment to the world. The economics of motion pictures makes faith in voodoo equal to those in a Vegas casino. Bets on making money are made on hunches, odd rules and track records. “Men have a certain touch with material, you can tell by the T-shirts they wear!” “Women directors play with different instincts because they often have babies!” Outliers come along much more often than are admitted. Television is a different matter. There are more women in starring roles, writing and running shows, and even in executive suites. The movies will catch up…

Read the full interview here, and read Emma Watson’s interview here!

Matthew Lewis appeared on U.K. show This Morning on Monday, to talk about his role as Sean Balmforth in ITV’s Happy Valley.

Balmforth has a ‘murky back story’, currently putting him as suspect of a nasty crime, and with only two episodes to go, Lewis teases at answers to come:

“We’ve got two episodes to go. We’re going to have quite a lot of revelations in the next episode in regards to Sean and what he’s been up to and why he’s there”

“The problem with him is he’s not quite an alcoholic but he’s well on his way to becoming one and because of that he simply can’t remember a lot of stuff and there are a lot of blackouts in his memory – that’s why we have to piece together this jigsaw.”

You may have noticed the impressive moustache Lewis is flaunting lately. Apparently there are mixed views about it!:

“Funnily enough, no one comes near me when I’ve got this and I don’t know whether they don’t recognise me or because they are terrified of me! I’m not sure which it is, but it’s quite the repellent!”

Finally, Matthew told a story from A Celebration of Harry Potter in January, during which Lewis and Rupert Grint took part in various panels together. Apparently, Rupert had a confession to make!

“I saw Rupert last month – and I’d not seen him for a few years – and we were in Orlando together for the new Harry Potter Wizarding World thing and he told me that he’d been going to this restaurant.

“And I said ‘oh that’s one of my favourite restaurants’ and he said, ‘I know… because I’ve been putting all my food on your tab for the past several months!’

“Apparently when he came in the manager was like ‘oh you’re Matthew’s friend’ and he was like ‘yeah’ and [the manager] said ‘is Matthew picking this up?’ and Rupert said ‘yeah, he told me to come down and said he was covering it’ and it’s been going on my bill ever since!”

Read Matt’s recent interview with The Mirror here, and watch a clip from his appearance on This Morning below!