‘Harry Potter and the Cursed Child’ Producers Consider a Broadway Run

‘Harry Potter and the Cursed Child’ Producers Consider a Broadway Run

Alert the Department of Magical Transportation. Harry Potter is considering a trip to New York.

The lead producers of “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child,” the new play that is a sequel — and the eighth story — in the Harry Potter canon, said this weekend that, having won over critics and audiences in London, they are ready to start thinking about a Broadway production.

The producers, Sonia Friedman and Colin Callender, said in a joint telephone interview that they have made no decisions, but that they expect to begin conversations in London this week and to schedule meetings in New York in the fall.

“Our only immediate objective was to get to today, but Colin and I said that next week we’re going to sit down, have a cappuccino and start talking about what’s next,” Ms. Friedman said on Saturday, during a break in the play’s gala opening (for friends of the show; a separate opening for critics, which prompted the publication of reviews, was held last Monday). “Of course, it would be disingenuous to think New York and Broadway weren’t part of our thinking.”

No specifics have been decided, she said. “Harry Potter, the brand and the story, are as iconic over there as anywhere in the world, and, Colin and I being theater producers and Broadway producers, of course it’s on our radar, but where, how, when and with whom, we have no idea.” She added: “We don’t have answers yet, but will have some soon. Until then, if you hear anything about where we’re going, when we’re going or how we’re going, it’s not true.”

Although there have been some reports that the producers were considering a production in Toronto before New York, Mr. Callender dismissed that. “I don’t know where the Toronto gossip came from, but it’s not based on anything,” he said.

“Harry Potter and the Cursed Child” is unlike anything that is succeeding on Broadway now. It is a play in an era dominated by musicals, it has a running time of 5 hours 15 minutes (staged in two parts to be seen either in one day or over two consecutive nights), and it does not (thus far) rely on celebrity casting.

Nonetheless, a Broadway production of the play is as close to a surefire success as one can imagine.

The title, of course, is peerless — the series of novels, by J. K. Rowling, has sold more than 450 million copies. And the play, by Jack Thorne — based on a story by Ms. Rowling, Mr. Thorne and the director, John Tiffany — opened in London to glowing reviews.

Ben Brantley, the chief theater critic for The New York Times, wrote that the play had achieved “a kind of magic that is purely theatrical yet somehow channels the addictive narrative grip of Ms. Rowling’s prose,” while Michael Billington, in The Guardian, called it “a thrilling theatrical spectacle.”

The play began previews in the West End in June, and tickets are sold out through next May. A new block of tickets, for seats through December 2017, are to go on sale Thursday.

The play’s script was released in book form over the weekend, and is expected to be the biggest book of the summer.

Ms. Friedman said that the producers were particularly pleased that the play seemed to be appealing to new theater audiences — a constant struggle for producers. She said that, during previews in London, an estimated 50 percent of ticket holders were new to theater, and much of the audience was 18 to 35 years old, which is significantly younger than the average theatergoer.

“It’s a dream — it’s the holy grail for a producer,” she said. “And they are respectful and incredibly engaged. Not one mobile phone has gone off in the auditorium.”

إبراهيم زكاغ

مدون وأحب القراءة وكل جديد التكنولوجيا والإنترنت . إنشاء فولفولي جاء من الرغبة في مشاركة تجربتي المتواضعة ولأكون مساهما ولو بالقليل في محتوى الإنترنت.

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