HBO to air standalone special on the making of new Harry Potter series | Harry Potter TV series
HBO has more Harry Potter magic on its hands; the company today announced a standalone behind-the-scenes special to accompany the TV adaptation of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone.
Finding Harry: The Craft Behind the Magic will offer “an in-depth look at the making of the first season”, including plenty of production footage and details about the lengthy UK-wide casting process for Harry, Ron and Hermione, played by Dominic McLaughlin, Alastair Stout and Arabella Stanton.
The teaser for the special, released Thursday, features interviews with actors like John Lithgow and Paapa Essiedu, who play Professor Albus Dumbledore and Severus Snape, as well as time spent with the many artisans who designed the updated Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. “It’s really incredible to play in such a big sandbox,” says a set designer over a model of a school castle. “We’re adding a level of world-building beyond what the audience is used to.”
According to the official synopsis, the special, narrated by series actor Nick Frost (Hagrid), provides “an inside look at the epic scale and meticulous care behind HBO’s new series.” “The Harry Potter series – told through the eyes of the artists, craftsmen and technicians who bring JK Rowling’s beloved books to life for a new generation.”
“Featuring interviews with members of the cast, production design, costume design and creature effects teams, this special episode chronicles the exhaustive process behind finding the new Harry, Ron and Hermione, while celebrating the astonishing attention to detail and immense talent that come together to populate this extraordinary world.”
“The Harry Potter stories are an extraordinary phenomenon,” Lithgow says in the trailer. “To reimagine the Harry Potter canon, to let it breathe, we bring to life all the things you know are going on in the wings but you can’t see them.”
“You wait forever to do something that means so much to people,” he adds.
Lithgow has previously said he was “disgusted” by the backlash to the series, which stemmed from Rowlings’ many public anti-transgender comments, as her books are “clearly on the side of the angels against intolerance and bigotry”. The expansive world of Harry Potter, including Rowling’s books, films, video games and drama worth an estimated £20bn ($25 billion), is consulting on the series as an executive producer.
The first trailer for the upcoming series – the first of the planned season for each of Rowling’s seven books – was released to great excitement online last Thursday. With more than 277 million organic views in the first 48 hours, it is now the top most watched trailer On HBO and HBO Max.
The behind-the-scenes special will air on April 5, months before the series’ planned Christmas premiere. The series, directed by Succession writer Francesca Gardiner and directed by Mark Mylod, began its closely guarded, big-budget production last July at Studios Leavesden in Hertfordshire, England.
