IMAGINING HOGSMEADE
"Azkaban" is a spookier story than the first two-the soul-sucking dementors, who guard Azkaban Prison, make their first appearance-and Cuaron's design team promises that the movie's palette will reflect the gathering darkness. For Hogsmeade, set designer Stuart Craig labored to avoid a "pretty, chocolate-box" village, creating a main street that swerves zanily. Honeydukes, the candy store, is floor-to-ceiling psychedelia, with tangles of licorice and-a Cuaron touch-Mexican skulls made of sugar. (To prevent candy jars from magically emptying between takes, the cast has been told that the goodies are lacquer-coated. They're not.) Cuaron also reimagined the role of Professor Dumbledore after Richard Harris's death. British actor Michael Gambon now plays the Hogwarts headmaster as an elegant old hippie. Cuaron's outspokenness is also new to the franchise. Does the evil wizard Voldemort still remind him of George W. Bush, as he said recently? "In combination with Saddam," he says. "They both have selfish interests and are very much in love with power. Also, a disregard for the environment. A love for manipulating people. I read books four and five, and Fudge"- Rowling's slippery Minister of Magic-"is similar to Tony Blair. He's the ultimate politician. He's in denial about many things. And everything is for the sake of his own persona, his own power. The way the Iraq thing was handled was not unlike the way Fudge handled affairs in book four." Cuaron's scrappiness is either refreshing or worrying, depending on your stock portfolio.
Of course, Cuaron doesn't have full run of the joint. Columbus, who says he was "too physically exhausted" to direct the third movie, is serving as producer-and he makes no bones about the fact that he's doing it to "protect" the Potter world he adores. Awkward as the arrangement sounds, both men insist it's working. Mostly, Columbus advises his successor on how to handle a job he describes as running a three-ring circus. Shooting is often interrupted by kids scampering off to do schoolwork. (Under British law, child actors can work only four hours a day.) While they're gone, Cuaron hops on his bicycle and rides to the editing room, where he readies shots for his visual-effects team. "The biggest pressure on Alfonso is delivering sequences to the effects people early enough," Columbus says. The effects in "The Sorcerer's Stone," Columbus concedes, "weren't up to snuff" because of time pressures. On the second film, he scheduled eight extra months to get them right. For "Azkaban," Cuaron's team has spent six months on the dementors alone. Potter fans have grown used to a movie every Thanksgiving, but "Azkaban" will arrive in the teeth of the summer movie season on June 4, 2004. By then, the franchise could be in the midst of another creative shake-up. Radcliffe says he'll be riding the Nimbus 2000 in the fourth movie, "The Goblet of Fire," and it appears that his young costars, Watson and Rupert Grint, who plays Ron Weasley, will join him. Beyond that, they still have to ask Mom and Dad. "We're optimistic," producer Heyman says, "but it's early." As for Cuaron, his tour of duty in Harryland will end with "Azkaban." Whoever inherits the franchise next-Britain's Mike Newell ("Four Weddings and a Funeral") is on the shortlist-will get a nice signing bonus: Rowling's sequels have a knack for getting better.
© 2003 Newsweek, Inc.
"Azkaban" is a spookier story than the first two-the soul-sucking dementors, who guard Azkaban Prison, make their first appearance-and Cuaron's design team promises that the movie's palette will reflect the gathering darkness. For Hogsmeade, set designer Stuart Craig labored to avoid a "pretty, chocolate-box" village, creating a main street that swerves zanily. Honeydukes, the candy store, is floor-to-ceiling psychedelia, with tangles of licorice and-a Cuaron touch-Mexican skulls made of sugar. (To prevent candy jars from magically emptying between takes, the cast has been told that the goodies are lacquer-coated. They're not.) Cuaron also reimagined the role of Professor Dumbledore after Richard Harris's death. British actor Michael Gambon now plays the Hogwarts headmaster as an elegant old hippie. Cuaron's outspokenness is also new to the franchise. Does the evil wizard Voldemort still remind him of George W. Bush, as he said recently? "In combination with Saddam," he says. "They both have selfish interests and are very much in love with power. Also, a disregard for the environment. A love for manipulating people. I read books four and five, and Fudge"- Rowling's slippery Minister of Magic-"is similar to Tony Blair. He's the ultimate politician. He's in denial about many things. And everything is for the sake of his own persona, his own power. The way the Iraq thing was handled was not unlike the way Fudge handled affairs in book four." Cuaron's scrappiness is either refreshing or worrying, depending on your stock portfolio.
Of course, Cuaron doesn't have full run of the joint. Columbus, who says he was "too physically exhausted" to direct the third movie, is serving as producer-and he makes no bones about the fact that he's doing it to "protect" the Potter world he adores. Awkward as the arrangement sounds, both men insist it's working. Mostly, Columbus advises his successor on how to handle a job he describes as running a three-ring circus. Shooting is often interrupted by kids scampering off to do schoolwork. (Under British law, child actors can work only four hours a day.) While they're gone, Cuaron hops on his bicycle and rides to the editing room, where he readies shots for his visual-effects team. "The biggest pressure on Alfonso is delivering sequences to the effects people early enough," Columbus says. The effects in "The Sorcerer's Stone," Columbus concedes, "weren't up to snuff" because of time pressures. On the second film, he scheduled eight extra months to get them right. For "Azkaban," Cuaron's team has spent six months on the dementors alone. Potter fans have grown used to a movie every Thanksgiving, but "Azkaban" will arrive in the teeth of the summer movie season on June 4, 2004. By then, the franchise could be in the midst of another creative shake-up. Radcliffe says he'll be riding the Nimbus 2000 in the fourth movie, "The Goblet of Fire," and it appears that his young costars, Watson and Rupert Grint, who plays Ron Weasley, will join him. Beyond that, they still have to ask Mom and Dad. "We're optimistic," producer Heyman says, "but it's early." As for Cuaron, his tour of duty in Harryland will end with "Azkaban." Whoever inherits the franchise next-Britain's Mike Newell ("Four Weddings and a Funeral") is on the shortlist-will get a nice signing bonus: Rowling's sequels have a knack for getting better.
© 2003 Newsweek, Inc.
