People In The News

Transcript

Transcribed by Marigold

Introduction

Next on People in the News, the young wizard who’s conjured up a movie franchise.

Chris Columbus: People respond to the idea that maybe there’s some magic; maybe there’s some hope in our lives.

He was orphaned at an early age and raised by a dysfunctional family.

Dan: Harry’s had an incredibly tough life.

His talent was discovered when he got the invitation of a lifetime. Now Harry’s growing up. The wizard and wizardry behind Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

Hi. Welcome to People in the News, I’m Paula Zahn. He’s the young wizard in training with the round glasses and the lightning bolt scar and he’s back for another year at Hogwarts, back on the big screen, back to cast another spell on children and their parents worldwide. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets is the much anticipated follow up to the film, The Sorceror’s Stone, and AOL Time Warner which also owns CNN is hoping that the Chamber of Secrets like its predecessor will be pure magic at the box office. Here’s Bruce Burkhart.

Harry Potter lives in a world of fantasy in a place far far away. Just a boy, he’s beloved and admired by millions.

Comments from young fans:

He’s brave and adventurous.

And he doesn’t care what people tell him to do.

Harry’s friendly.

Harry’s not scared of anything.

Harry Potter is braver than anyone I’ve ever met.

Harry’s amazing.

Harry’s appeal is now a movie franchise. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, the second much anticipated installment in the film series has finally arrived. It had its world premiere in London, November 3. The movie is based on the second book in a series of novels chronicling the life of the young British wizard. The film’s director saw the appeal in Harry’s story immediately.

Chris: People respond to the idea of magic. In this day and age, people respond to the idea that maybe there’s some magic. Maybe there’s some hope in our lives.

And the actor who portrays Harry recognizes one of his best qualities.

Dan: He’s the underdog, which I think is one of the appeals of Harry; he’s the underdog who triumphs.

But for all his goodness, Harry’s life story begins sadly. It is believed he was born on July 31, 1980. A year later, he’s an orphan. His father, James, a wizard, his mother, Lily, a witch, are murdered by an evil dark lord. Harry is bundled up and delivered to his aunt and uncle’s home at 4 Privet Drive. With Harry, a letter explaining his tragic circumstance.

David Colbert (Author of “The Magical Worlds of Harry Potter”): He’s the only person to have survived the killing curse. He’s obviously an incredibly powerful wizard. That’s how he got his lightning scar.

Scene of Harry showing his scar to Ron on the train.

There are also less visible marks, says Lee Williams, a fourth grade teacher.

Lee: His loneliness. His isolation. The fact that he’s an orphan. That’s he’s been abused, physically and emotionally, by the Dursleys. And he’s very much alone in the world.

To his surprise, Harry discovers he can talk to snakes, infuriating his magic fearing uncle.

Scene of Harry being locked in his cupboard after talking to the snake at the zoo.

But magic always finds Harry. (In) a scene in the film, a very special invitation arrives at number 4 Privet Drive. (“Dear Mr Potter, We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.”)…..  Hagrid, a gentle giant, is Harry’s guide to all things magic. (“You’re a wizard, Harry”… “I’m a what?”)… Soon Harry is buying school necessities, strange books, potion ingredients and of course, a wand. In September 1991, Harry, now eleven, embarks on his brand new life, as captured in the film.

Scene of Harry at the train station.

Even at Hogwarts, Harry has to learn to fit in.

Dan: In the first film, he’s discovering this world all around him and he’s kind of very reactive. But in the second film, when he finds out that something bad could happen to his home, he tries to protect it, so he’s very proactive.

The dueling scene

The troubles Harry Potter faces in his first year at the school of wizardry do not disappear in his second.

Harry hanging from the door of Ron’s car.

When People in the News continues, a look at Harry’s creator, and how the young wizard saved her from poverty and depression.

The person who knows Harry Potter inside and out is JK Rowling. While on a train journey in 1990, Rowling says Harry popped into her life.

JK: He came very suddenly, the idea for this boy who didn’t know what he was until he was eleven and then he got this invitation to go off to wizard’s school and I had this very physical response to the idea. I just felt so excited. I just thought it would be such fun to write.

While the English countryside flew by, images of Harry, Hermione, Ron, Hagrid and even Hogwarts materialized. (Rowling has said that she modeled Hermione on herself at age 11.) Like Harry, Rowling would come to know misery. In 1993, she moved to Edinburgh, Scotland. Divorced, she was a single mother with an infant daughter. Depressed and on public assistance, Rowling says she wrote about Harry to keep sane. Rowling would flee her dreary apartment for coffee houses where she’d fill notebooks with Harry’s story. The young boy became her knight in shining armor.

JK: I never dreampt Harry Potter was going to be the thing that saved us. Harry Potter was my personal ambition and I often felt selfish for pursuing it.

The pursuit was a long one. It took Rowling who had never had anything published before, five years to write book one and then another year to find a publisher. In 1997, Rowling’s quest was successful.

JK: By anyone’s standards and certainly by mine, I am now rich.

There are more than 150 million Harry Potter books in print worldwide. Rowling is working on book 5 in the series now.

Interviewer: How’s progress going on the next one everyone’s eagerly awaiting

JK: Really well, actually. Really well. Shouldn’t be too long now.

Interviewer: Okay. Thank you very much.

JK: Thanks a lot.

Harry’s story is published in at least 47 languages from Albanian to Zulu. Harry’s made the multimillionaire Rowling one of the wealthiest women in Britain. And while she remains uneasy in public. Harry is very visible.

David Colbert: Harry is recognized everywhere he goes as a hero.

David Colbert is the author of “The Magical Worlds of Harry Potter”. He says Harry as well as the creatures he meets are not unique.

David Colbert: Many of the creatures in the books come out of JK Rowlings imagination and they’re wonderful creatures. But also many of them come from myth and literature and legend.

For instance, Harry’s owl, Hedwig.

David Colbert: Owls are the mail carriers in Harry’s world. There’s something about carrying the mail. It’s almost as if they know. They know who the message is from. They know what it’s about. Owls were the emblem of the goddess Minerva, who was also the goddess of wisdom.

Hedwig is named for Saint Hedwig, the patron saint of orphans, orphans like Harry. Harry’s advisor provides another link to mythology.

David Colbert: We’ve met Albus Dumbledore before. He’s like Merlin; he has the long gray beard and the long flowing hair and he dresses in robes. He’s old; he’s wise; he’s somewhat mysterious. But his first name Albus is the Latin word for ‘white’ so of course he’s fighting the dark forces, the forces of evil, and it’s the perfect name for a wizard who’s doing that.

And don’t forget the troll, the giant, and the Phoenix that rises from the flames. But it’s Harry himself who’s most  legendary.

David Colbert: Harry is a universal hero. He’s a hidden monarch like King Arthur was. He was hidden away as a child, so that he would be protected. He doesn’t even know that he’s a great wizard.

All heroes go on adventures and receive magical charms like Harry does in the film.

David Colbert: Heroes have always had friends who helped them. Or they had friends with special skills. Luke Skywalker didn’t go anywhere without R2D2 and C3PO.

And our hero, Harry, goes nowhere without Ron and Hermione.

Dan: He’s had an incredibly tough life and he’s just comes through it all with the help of his friends, Ron and Hermione.

As seen in the film, Harry can’t make things change without them.

Scene of Harry, Ron and Hermione drinking the polyjuice potion.

While Harry may follow in King Arthur’s footsteps, (“Scared Potter?”…”You wish.”) most of his young fans miss the legendary nuance.

Lee Williams: I think the children all see Harry as a hero but in the very simplest of forms. He’s the Superman of Hogwarts. He rescues his friends; he saves the day; he always comes out on top.

When the story of Harry Potter continues, Harry’s magic launches a movie franchise and the second installment is scary.

The orphan boy who grew up to be a wizard is now famous around the world.

Young Reader: Harry had a thin face, knobly knees, black hair and bright green eyes.

In July of 2000, obsessed fans lined up at the midnight hour to get hold of JK Rowling’s latest, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. The fourth and latest book in the Harry Potter series burned up records left and right. The biggest advance order ever. Biggest printing ever. Biggest takeover ever of the New York Times best seller list. Hollywood was salivating. But Warner Bros had already bitten. The film studio had secured rights for the first three Harry books at a bargain basement price of $700,000.

Daniel Fierman: They’re expecting to roll naked in hundreds of millions of dollars, you know. I mean, this is it for Warner Bros.

Daniel Fierman is with Entertainment Weekly, like Warner Bros and CNN all part of the AOL - Time Warner company.

Daniel Feieman: Look, if you’re a movie studio, the thing you want more than anything is a franchise, something you can go back to again and again. You get all sorts of ancillary revenue streams from, you know. The merchandise, the tie ins, the coke bottles, the games, the blah blah blah blah blah.

Warner Bros got the franchise deal by promising the anxious JK Rowling they’d stay true to her story and Harry’s millions of young fans. But Hollywood still had to find their Harry.

JK: When looking for Harry, I did actually meet my physically perfect Harry in Northern Ireland. I was talking to a group of about 200 kids and doing a reading. And I kept looking up as you do when you’re doing a reading. And then I looked dead center and he was just sitting there staring at me and I completely lost my place and went ‘Harry’!

A lookalike but not an actor so the search continued.

Daniel Fierman: Finding Harry Potter was incredibly difficult. It took months and months and months. They saw thousands of children.

Only weeks before cameras were to roll on the first movie, actor Daniel Radcliffe was finally cast to play the literary hero.

Dan (in an interview before the first movie was filmed): I have read the least of Harry Potter in my class. Yet I managed to get the part somehow.

As the star, the thirteen year old Radcliffe holds the key to a huge movie franchise. It’s a ton of pressure.

Dan: It’s obviously quite kind of nerve wracking. But as well as that it’s just a lot of fun cause you do get to inspire people.

So far Warner Bros commitment to JK Rowling and Harry Potter’s fans has paid off. The first movie grossed just under a billion dollars worldwide making expectations high for the second installment in the series.

Dan: We really want to live up to the successs of the first film and possibly hopefully better it maybe.

The second movie in the series is very different than the first.

Chris Columbus: And I thought we were so incredibly faithful the first time around that I thought on Chamber of Secrets we could remain faithful to the story but we could open the film up a little bit. I wanted the film to be a better experience this time around. I wanted it to be more exciting. We immediately start with the story and I wanted it to be more suspenseful.

In addition to new characters, the story has a darker tone.

JK: There are changes this year. With different characters, and even more visual effects and I think it’s more frightening. Definitely more frightening than the first film. There were a couple places where I really worked. I know I was dead.

And there are more movies to come. Hoping that fans will not tire of looking at the world through Harry’s glasses, Warner Bros has bought the rights to Rowling’s next three books. But there are questions about what will happen after the third movie is made. Director Chris Columbus has stepped down from his directing role to spend more time with his family and Daniel Radcliffe is signed on only through the third movie. The young actors in the film remain optimistic about their involvement in the movies.

Rupert: I think I’d like to do most of these films cause I really do enjoy them.

But Columbus has some advice for them.

Chris Columbus: If you were asking me, I think it would probably be a good idea for them to start to live lives as real kids after they finish the third film.

The death of Richard Harris the actor who portrays Dumbledore at the end of October leaves at least one role for Warner Bros to fill.

JK: We had known he was ill but hadn’t expected that it was imminent and he’s going to be very difficult to replace and I honestly don’t know if they’ve even thought about whom.

For now, fans look forward to the new Harry Potter movie and the fifth book in his series. And while no one but JK Rowling knows for sure what’s in Harry’s future, it’s clear that Harry Potter, once a mere literary legend, is now a screen star. (“Let us hope that Mr Potter will always be around to save the day.”… “Don’t worry. I will be.”)

The fifth Harry Potter book is not expected out this year and that’s raising some eyebrows among anxious fans but JK Rowling says she never committed to a deadline for the new book, adding that she does have a life outside of Hogwarts. Rowling was married last December and recently announced that she was pregnant.