Tag Archives: Harry Potter

LA Gets Its Own Wizarding World

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Universal Studios Hollywood is replacing The Gibson Ampitheatre with a new Wizarding World of Harry Potter attraction.

This represents a phase in NBCUniversal’s $1.6 billion Evolution Plan, unanimously approved by the L.A. County Board of Supervisors on April 23. Universal sweetened its proposal by agreeing to contribute $13.5 million to help revitalize the L.A. River and improve its adjacent bike path.

That means work can begin this summer on the Wizarding World of Harry Potter, as well as upgraded TV production studios, office space and infrastructure on the Universal Studios lot. Besides the new attraction, NBCUniversal’s 25-year plan calls for upgrades throughout the 391-acre Universal City property, including new office, retail and studio space and post-production facilities.

Harry Potter’s Sales Wizardry

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Pottermore.com sold £3 million worth of Harry Potter books in its first month reports The Bookseller.com. The store went online March 27 and rang up £1 million of sales in its first three days of operation.

The books are sold DRM-free. A spokesman for Pottermore said piracy has diminished since an initial increase because “the community had rejected these illegal versions.” Translation: Piracy hasn’t been stopped, but customers will buy from the legitimate source if they like the price and the platform is easy to use.

[Thanks to Andrew Porter for the story.]

Alan Rickman Profile

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My family has been Alan Rickman fans since he played Colonel Brandon in Sense and Sensibility, an admiration infinitely deepened by his appearance in Galaxy Quest and as Severus Snape in the Harry Potter films.

Now his opening on Broadway in “Seminar” is celebrated in the LA Times with a lengthy profile:  

[He] is applying a different brand of dark arts as Leonard, the caustic and embittered novelist at the center of Theresa Rebeck’s new play, “Seminar”…. With barbed tongue, he terrorizes a group of aspiring writers who’ve paid a princely sum for him to evaluate their work. That is, when he’s not trying to bed the women in the group despite the yawning age gap.

Fans Love Snape Best

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Who is the public’s favorite Harry Potter character? Series publisher Bloombury took a poll and the winner was — Severus Snape?

The potions master, Head of Slytherin and Death Eater played by Alan Rickman onscreen received nearly 20% of 70,000 votes cast. It wasn’t even close. Hermione Granger finished second. Harry Potter ran fourth!

What kind of hero loses a popularity poll about his own series? Can you imagine a poll about the Lensman Series being won by Nadreck of Palain VII instead of Kimball Kinnison?

The full press release follows the jump.

[Thanks to Andrew Porter for the story.]

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Ditch Quidditch, Says Alum

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Chris Sesno isn’t giving his alma mater another dime until they promise none of it will be given to the college Quidditch team.

Sesno grumpily declared in an open letter to Middlebury College he posted at AOL Fanhouse:  

Before I decide to donate some of my hard-earned dollars to the College I love, I would like to express a few grievances about the financial allocations process, mainly about the absurdity of providing funding to Harry Potter wannabees who trounce around with brooms that don’t fly between their legs and put my beloved Middlebury on the national radar for its Quidditch ‘team.’

He makes predictably unfavorable comparisons between the Quidditch program and “legitimate” academic programs and student services that have suffered cuts. This seemed to me a case of comparing apples and oranges. Does Middlebury spend nothing at all on any other athletics? If it does fund athletics, then any funded team is be liable for the same criticism. 

Sesno adds that the college’s rugby program had to pay its own way to the 2009 national tournament (where it won the championship). But that doesn’t mean the rugby team’s on-campus activities are unfunded.

I felt the true comparison would be between the rugby team’s tournament costs and  Middlebury College’s Quidditch team’s expenses when they play for the Intercollegiate Quidditch Association championship.

Or not. You see, the College Quidditch World Cup is always played at Middlebury College.

Finding Your Local Hogwarts

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Katherine L. Cohen, CEO and Founder of ApplyWise, claims many students want to attend a campus reminiscent of the settings they’ve read about in J. K. Rowling’s books and seen in the movies made from them.

What that means, exactly, was analyzed by the LA Times Culture Monster arts blog:

The inherent creepiness of Gothic architecture is a given in the “Harry Potter” movies, but there’s also an undercurrent of romanticism at work — a romanticism for higher education and the monastic pursuit of knowledge. The abundance of stained glass and the high, cathedral ceilings give the secular Hogwarts campus a quasi-religious feel.

To help students locate the sought after setting, Cohen and ApplyWise are compiling a list of the colleges and universities likeliest to look and feel like Hogwarts . Number One on the list is the University of Chicago:

The University of Chicago has got Hogwarts written all over it, not least of all in its majestic dining center, Hutchinson Hall, which just so happens to be a replica of Oxford’s Christ Church (the same used in the Harry Potter films). This striking architectural similarity, coupled with the school’s gargoyle gothic facades, is sure to ring any Harry Potter fan’s bell.

Always Call It, “Research”

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Huge sales of the Chinese children’s novel The Adventurous Prince by Zhou Yiwen are anticipated when it’s released at the end of June because school children gave the 100,000 copies distributed in test marketing an enthusiastic reception. And why not? They love the Harry Potter series, and Chinese meda claim Zhou has plagiarized from J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire:  

“We are confident our book and its content are totally original. It has been thoroughly checked by our editors,” [the Chinese publisher's spokesperson] said.

Chinese media alleged Tuesday that Zhou lifted 18 specific details from the Harry Potter series and that Rowling is preparing to file lawsuits. If found guilty, Zhou and his publishers could face a fine of around US$138 million, the reports claimed.

It’s ironic that at the same time the Chinese plagiarism story was making news it was revealed that Rowling has been accused of copying “substantial parts” of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire from deceased fellow British writer Adrian Jacobs.

Whoever it was, somewhere along the line somebody wrote a heckuva story.

[Thanks to Andrew Porter for the story.]

Snapshots 14

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Five developments of interest to fans.

(1) If you habla Español, Roberto De Antuñano’s Ultralinea science fiction podcast may be for you. Roberto is the Entertainment editor for MSN Mexico (www.prodigy.msn.com), and he’s been a sci-fi fan since the golden age of 12. “Ultralìnea” takes its name from the Spanish version of Dan Simmon’s “Fatline.” The first podcast discussed Lois McMaster Bujold’s Miles Vorkosigan series. The latest argues whether Star Wars is science fiction or not – a familiar ploy that is just as successful in translation, judging by Roberto’s claim that the podcast has exceeded 200,000 downloads. (If the Crotchety Old Fan hasn’t already tried that one, I guarantee he will before next week.)

(2) Orbit is offering dollar e-books to readers on a rotating basis. The dollar titles are available at onedollarorbit.com. The January book is Brent Weeks’ epic fantasy, The Way of Shadows. Next month they’ll be offering Iain M. Banks’ Use of Weapons.

Kirk makes gunpowder(3) Using the gunpowder formula from the Star Trek episode “Arena”, a blogger takes the makings past TSA inspectors who have apparently never seen the episode. Her only trouble comes from inspectors who want to confiscate her dangerous bamboo flutes.

(4) I’d hate to be J.K. Rowling, hearing that my productivity determines whether British booksellers have jobs. As the Guardian sees it:

Not just one era came to an end this year, but two – and as a result publishers and booksellers will have to do without the main life-supporting drugs they’ve recently relied on.

The Tales of Beedle the Bard (currently number two, but after only 10 days on sale) looks likely to be JK Rowling ‘s last magical offering for some time, ending a series of roughly biennial mega-sellers that began with Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire smashing records in 2000.

The Economist(5) Robert Sawyer pointed out on his blog that, in November, The Economist’s “World in 2009″ issue included a “Calendar for 2009″ whose first entry for August reads “Montreal hosts the World Science Fiction Convention, where an author’s fantasy can lead to a Hugo Award.”

[Thanks to David Klaus, Andrew Porter and John Mansfield for some of the items included in this post.]

Quidditch Anyone?

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Muggle Quidditch

ROFL! — It’s time for the Intercollegiate Quidditch World Cup!

See and hear members of Boston University‘s team enthuse about the flightless version of Harry Potter’s favorite sport:

She plays Quidditch, the international sport of the wizarding world, which has players zooming around on broomsticks and using balls to score points and knock one another off course.

The earthbound variation is called Muggle Quidditch. The sport originated in 2005 when a student at Middlebury College adapted the game for the nonmagical world. Its popularity quickly spread, and today more than 150 colleges throughout the United States have Quidditch teams….

Middlebury College won the Intercollegiate Quidditch World Cup. Vassar College came in second, and Chestnut Hill College placed third. For more information about Boston University Quidditch, visit the team’s Facebook page.