When spares are spared, when time is turned, when unseen children murder their fathers: Then will the Dark Lord return.Back in 2006, my family went into Toronto to see the musical adaptation of The Lord of the Rings, primarily because Mallory was a Tolkein superfan. She and I were the only ones familiar with the plotline, so when the production was over, we seemed to be the only members of the family not confused or bored or generally underwhelmed: and as for my little girl, who was eight at the time, she was completely blown away. I think that when it comes to reading Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, a person's experience might be similar to my family's at LotR (which was eventually determined to be a massive commercial flop): it'll all come down to what you bring to it. As for me, I've read all the Harry Potter books (but as a Mom reading to my kids; not as a superfan in my own right), and I thought this script was pretty all right. A superfan will either automatically love whatever she's just read because of nostalgia, or like I've read in some reviews, be the most disappointed of all because they've seen YouTube videos of J. K. Rowling saying she'd never do this or that in her books if she had them to do over (thises and thats that make it into the play), or they've read all the fanfiction out there (that have already covered the basics of this plot), or they can remember some obscure scene that is inconsistent with the new storyline. And, obviously, anyone who didn't like the Harry Potter books or movies isn't going to like this either. What I really wonder is if the live staging of the play itself would have mass appeal for people who (like the majority of my family at the LotR musical) have little knowledge of the previous canon; or would they leave confused or bored or generally underwhelmed? Alls I know for sure is that Rowling has enough superfans to keep the show running for a long, long time. Spoilers (small ones, but nonetheless) ahead.
There are mountain trolls riding Graphorns through Hungary, there are giants with winged tattoos on their backs walking through the Greek seas, and the werewolves have gone entirely underground.Nineteen years after the Battle of Hogwarts, Harry Potter is the Head of Magical Law Enforcement, Hermione Granger is Minister of Magic, and Ron manages the Weasly joke shop in Hogsmeade (poor Ron – he is so not relevant in the play). Not only is Harry an overworked, paper-shuffling bureaucrat, but he just can't seem to connect with his middle child Albus: the boy was sorted into Slytherin House when he first got to Hogwarts, he's a mediocre wizard, his only friend is Draco Malfoy's son, Scorpius, and with his father's burdensome legend hanging over him, Albus regrets having been born Harry Potter's son (which he continuously, sulkily, demonstrates, and then comes right out and says). When Harry confiscates a Time-Turner from an errant wizard (Le gasp! These were all supposed to have been destroyed years ago!), Albus and Scorpius decide to meddle in the past, and in the process, unwittingly awaken Dark Forces (Good thing Draco has an even better totally forbidden Time-Turner, too, so all the old chums can go back and attempt to set things straight!)
That is, very sketchily, the plot, and right from the start I have to say that having a new story based on time travel feels like a cheat – anything can happen, and honestly, everything that does happen here (Let's go back in time! Oh no, we've made things worse! Let's go back again! Oh no, it's even worse! Let's go back in time again!) has been done before. And I didn't much care for the grownup friends: I didn't believe that Hermione (the cleverest witch of all) would have hidden the Time-Turner behind a simple puzzle that could be solved by children; I didn't like Harry moaning around, “How can I be expected to know what a good father looks like when I never had a role model, good or bad?” (when he in fact started off with the worst of role models in Uncle Vernon and eventually knew the paternalistic love of some fine men); and poor Ron wasn't around for much more than comic relief, with the odd Oooof when he'd bend over, or a lame game of Got Your Nose. On the other hand, while Albus reads as too moody to be likeable (perhaps he's more sympathetic off the page), I thought that Scorpius was a clever and engaging character. Here Scorpius is when Albus greets him with a hug on the Hogwarts Express:
Okay. Hello. Um. Have we hugged before? Do we hug?I chuckled at most of the things he said; recognised in Scorpius the ideal of adolescent friendship that Rowling did such a good job of demonstrating in her books. And, ultimately, it might be unfair to judge this story merely by what's on the page: there's magic here and I imagine the effects are dazzling (or creepy, as in any time I read that there were whispers and Parseltongue buzzing around the audience). I'd love to see how they achieve the whole time passing montage of Albus' first three years at Hogwarts; would be interested to see what they do with the Trolley Witch (but again, if she has prevented students from leaving the train for over a hundred years, and all a couple of boys need to do is jump from the roof? Come on.) I found it interesting that there were so many instances of stage directions that read more like omniscient narrator asides than actual stage directions, as in This is almost a Spartacus moment (whatever that means) or SCORPIUS appears at the back of the stage. He looks at his friend talking to a girl – and part of him likes it and part of him doesn't. And I had to wonder if Harry's bad dreams – about living again with the Dursleys as a child or Hagrid rescuing him from the remote cabin on the island – were more about giving background to those new to Harry Potter than adding to the storyline: as dreams, these scenes make no sense to me, but as background, they might have somehow worked better as memories. I'm sure that, like with my experience seeing the LotR musical, it must be very difficult to make sure everyone in the audience has enough information to follow along. As a reading experience, it might have worked better as a novelisation.
As you can see, there was much I liked and some I didn't but here's my biggest complaint (And here is the only real spoiler; you have been warned): Why did it have to be Voldemort again? Seven books were written to show the entire story arc of his rise and absolute forever, double-locked-it-no-erasies, defeat: throw in some time travel and suddenly nothing that comes before matters; you've undermined the reality and meaningfulness of the entire series. Anything could have happened nineteen years after the Battle of Hogwarts but this particular storyline feels like a poke at the superfans. In a way, so is a black actress playing Hermione in the stage play: I would agree that there's no reason why she can't be black, and of course the world could actually use some more diversity, and I understand that it's not like J. K. Rowling personally did the casting, but by her being excited about the casting, it's like Rowling is challenging the superfans and saying, "This is, and always has been, my story; not yours." I don't believe it's racist for the superfans to have complained; they just love the world they know and don't want changes in it; and I understand that. So the bottom line is: I liked this, didn't love it, would probably give 3.5 stars and am rounding down because I expected better.
And here's why I care about the Harry Potter superfans: Working in a bookstore, I got to see how excited people were about the release of a new Harry Potter story after nine years; a huge chunk of the lives of these people who have been wanting a new story forever. Plenty of them were afraid that they wouldn't like reading a script -- more than one said, "Ugh, it will be just like studying Shakespeare in high school" -- but they all lined up and waited for our midnight release nonetheless. Okay, I didn't actually work the midnight release (we were in Stratford seeing Macbeth, because we actually do enjoy live theatre, and, well, Shakespeare), but I did work on cash the next day and it was a constant stream of costumers coming in just for this book; people who haven't been in a bookstore in years. So many of them were clutching the book to their heart like a love letter, and it was a fun day for me as so many of them left so happy (and especially since we were giving out free lightning bolt emblazoned tote bags that most of the customers weren't expecting; who doesn't enjoy making the day of so many?) These people were all so happy and so expectant that I really do hope they are satisfied by The Cursed Child; and yet I'm worried that these are exactly the most likely to be disappointed (except for that brand of superfan who would buy and enjoy a phonebook if it had Rowling's name on the cover). Also: this was Mallory's copy of the book I read, and as she hasn't had enough time to get into it, I have no idea if my own little superfan will be satisfied or not. And I hope that this is LotR all over again and she gets completely blown away.