It’s been a mere two months since the newest Harry Potter film, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, was released in cinemas worldwide (in fact, in some eastern european countries and in Hong Kong the movie doesn’t open until this week), but sights are already set on the future of the series. The movie adaptations made their respective debuts in theaters one and a half years apart from eachother, and this relatively short time span in between films meant that pre-production on the next installment had to commence while the current film was in its final stages, and shooting on the new part shortly after the prior one hit cinemas.

This proficient production schedule is necessitated by the puberty-induced rapid maturing of the three lead actors Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter), Rupert Grint (Ron Weasley) and Emma Watson (Hermione Granger), who, as the producers fear, will grow out of their roles if the films fail to more or less mimick the character’s age progression in the books (each book starts with a new school year, i.e. the characters would be exactly a year older than at the beginning of the previous book). But the one year age difference in between books does not equal the 1.5 year age difference of the actors in between films, which is why 16 year old Daniel Radcliffe played a 14 year old Harry Potter in Goblet of Fire (while the age of the actor and his character were the same in the first movie). If you apply the 1.5 year movie release cycle onto the adaptations of books 5, 6 and 7 (the finale), Radcliffe would already be 21 in the seventh film, playing a seventeen year old Harry Potter!

Considering this, rumours that Radcliffe, Grint and Granger might be replaced by younger actors at one point in the series shouldn’t come as a surprise (admittedly, it still sounds like a long shot; many actors and actresses in their early twenties portray teenagers in various movies and particularly in television series). For now though, all three of them are confirmed to reprise their roles in the fifth movie, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Speculation exists that because of the book’s length (it’s the longest of the series so far), the film will have an extended running time, which could imply a longer production phase. But since the Goblet of Fire movie was not significantly longer than Prisoner of Azkaban (despite the book consisting of nearly twice the amount of pages) it is safe to assume that Order of the Phoenix will be released ‘on schedule’: in June 2007, 1.5 years after Goblet of Fire.

You can also be fairly sure that most of the adult actors will receive renewed contracts. The only notable replacement in between films so far was that of Richard Harris, who’s Dumbledore role was given into the care of Micheal Gambon after the actor passed away. Confirmed returning cast members include Ralph Fiennes (Lord Voldemort), Julie Walters (Molly Weasley) and Katie Leung (Cho Chang). The first new addition comes with british actress Imelda Staunton (Oscar nominated for her role as Vera Drake in the film of the same name) who will play the film’s main antagonist Dolores Umbridge, the deceitfully cruel ministry witch with the toad-like face. Furthermore, the roles of Kingsley Shaklebolt and Nymphomadora Tonks have been cast, but WarnerBros. has yet to announce the actor and actress that were selected. The same goes for the role of the peculiar Ravenclaw student Luna Lovegood, according to recent reports an actress has been selected out of a couple of thousand hopefuls. No name announced to the public yet.

With all child extras found, the open casting for the new film has come to an end. The casting agents are currently on the look out for actors and actresses to play the young James and Lily Potter, Sirius Black, Severus Snape, Remus Lupin and Peter Pettigrew for a flashback scene. According to Enchantment Casting, an agency that has represented many young Harry Potter related hopefuls, the parts of Marietta Edgecomb (Cho Chang’s ravenclaw friend) and Lavender Brown (a fellow Gryffindor student) are not slated to be cast. All of the adult extra casting will take place after Christmas. Debunked casting rumours include Anna Friel (wife of David Thewlis, Professor Lupin in Prisoner of Azkaban) as Tonks, Julianne Nicholson as Lily Potter and Elizabeth Hurley as Bellatrix Lestrange.

The shooting of the film itself will start in January or February 2006 back in the UK, after Prague was briefly considered as a new filming location, due to a lower tax rate for film crews. Producer David Heyman recently decided against this though, citing the additional costs of set material transportation and cast and crew relocation as the main reasons. The film will be directed by David Yates, who has gained most of his experience in television. His résumée includes The Girl in the Café (2005, TV), Sex Traffic (2004, TV), The Young Visiters (2003, TV), State of Play (2003, TV Series) and Rank (2002). Before Yates was officially announced by WarnerBros., the studio had offered the job to the likes of Mira Nair (Monsoon Wedding, Vanity Fair), Jean-Pierre Jeunet (Alien: Resurrection, Amélie, A Very Long Engagement) and Matthew Vaughn (Layer Cake, Snatch, Lock, Stock and two Smoking Barrels). Nair decided against it for reasons unknown, Jeunet felt his creative input was too limited with actors and script out of his reach, and Vaughn’s vision of the film was too graphic and violent for the studio’s taste.

Steven Kloves has bowed out of the project to delve into new fields, after having adapted all of the first four Potter books into screenplays. Writer Micheal Goldenberg, who penned the scripts for Peter Pan (2003) and Contact (1997), has taken over the post, and is currently hard at work at completing the first shooting script for Order of the Phoenix. Kloves however, after reading Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (book 6) when it was released earlier this year, begged WarnerBros. to bring him back on for the sixth movie. His children were reportedly dismayed at the prospect of having their father at home with them more often instead of working on Harry Potter! The studio gladly gave him his job back.

Considering the book’s wealthy content, it will be interesting to find out where Micheal Goldenberg and David Yates will locate the story’s essence and to thus follow which plot points and characters will be sacrificied in favor of a reasonable running time and a coherent film. This however, is a topic for another X-Realms article, one that is sure to follow once the first story details and rumours start leaking from the sets. In the meantime, new readers and members of the X-Boards are invited to follow and discuss all the latest developments regarding the film-in-making in our newly set up subforum for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.

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