between
Harry Potter
and the
Lord of the Rings
. It’s sort of crazy, because I just wish
Harry Potter
all the best and I’m sure it’ll be great. I’m a huge fan of the books, so I’m looking forward to it.”
Not surprisingly, all four Harry Potter novels jumped to the top of the UK bestseller lists shortly before the release of the film version of
Sorcerer’s Stone
. Actually, the top five slots were all held by J.K. Rowling’s creation, one of them being the movie tie-in version of the first novel. Bloomsbury Publishing enthused, “It is wonderful news and we are just delighted. It is quite funny to have the top five spots, considering there are only four Harry Potter stories so far. We couldn’t have wished for better publicity from the film. Now people are rushing back to the bookshops to read the book first.”
NBC aired a one-hour special entitled
Harry Potter: Behind the Magic,
a behind-the-scenes look at the film and its special effects.
Early in the process of shooting
Chamber of Secrets
, director Chris Columbus mentioned that he might be interested in shooting all seven Harry Potter films. Ultimately, though, he would decidethat two was enough, in order to prevent further separation from his family.
At the premiere of
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone
in L.A., actors dressed as characters from the film greeted people on their way into the theater. (Frank Trapper/Corbis)
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone
opened to very positive reviews, though some complained that it followed the novel too closely and, for a film, that made for uneven pacing. Nonetheless, the film quickly went on to become a box office blockbuster all around the world. The film was made for $125 million. It had an opening domestic box office weekend gross of $90,294,621. It’s total domestic gross was $317,575,550 and its foreign gross was $658,900,000, with a total worldwide gross of $976,475,550.
Members of London’s Great Ormond Street Hospital claimed that the Harry Potter novels were aiding patients both physically and emotionally. Lisa Lewer, a clinical nurse, noted, “Harry Potter’s predicaments are similar to the problems that face young people generally. Problems like dealing with the loss or separation from parents and family or the anxiety of forming new relationships inunfamiliar places. But the different ways Harry tackles them demonstrates to children that by exploring their own struggles they can often find ways of overcoming them.”
One of the praises offered to the first film was that it felt thoroughly British, even to the point of using British terms that Americans might not get. Emphasized director Chris Columbus, “I vowed to make the film as British as possible. Did they redub
A Hard Day’s Night
? Did they redub
A Man For All Seasons
? No, and we’re not going to do it with this one.”
Some American Harry fans were undaunted by the fact that
Sorcerer’s Stone
opened in Britain a week before it did so in America, going so far as to fly overseas for a screening.
In an interview with the BBC, Chris Columbus revealed a bit of information about
Chamber of Secrets
, noting that they had shot sequences involving a flying car and a giant spider.
J.K. Rowling used her considerable clout to raise awareness and funds to help fight child poverty, particularly in one-parent families. Said Rowling, “Lone parents and their children are the poorest groups in our society. We are a wealthy nation, yet we have one of the worst records of child poverty in the industrialized world. It is a scandal.”
Numerous interested parties had approached J.K. Rowling about stage rights to her novels, but the author has emphasized that she won’t even entertain such offers until, at the very earliest, 2007. As her agent Christopher Little told the newspaper the
Stage,
“We have had requests every week from all over the world in connection with the stage rights to
Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone
. It
Harry Potter
and the
Lord of the Rings
. It’s sort of crazy, because I just wish
Harry Potter
all the best and I’m sure it’ll be great. I’m a huge fan of the books, so I’m looking forward to it.”
Not surprisingly, all four Harry Potter novels jumped to the top of the UK bestseller lists shortly before the release of the film version of
Sorcerer’s Stone
. Actually, the top five slots were all held by J.K. Rowling’s creation, one of them being the movie tie-in version of the first novel. Bloomsbury Publishing enthused, “It is wonderful news and we are just delighted. It is quite funny to have the top five spots, considering there are only four Harry Potter stories so far. We couldn’t have wished for better publicity from the film. Now people are rushing back to the bookshops to read the book first.”
NBC aired a one-hour special entitled
Harry Potter: Behind the Magic,
a behind-the-scenes look at the film and its special effects.
Early in the process of shooting
Chamber of Secrets
, director Chris Columbus mentioned that he might be interested in shooting all seven Harry Potter films. Ultimately, though, he would decidethat two was enough, in order to prevent further separation from his family.
At the premiere of
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone
in L.A., actors dressed as characters from the film greeted people on their way into the theater. (Frank Trapper/Corbis)
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone
opened to very positive reviews, though some complained that it followed the novel too closely and, for a film, that made for uneven pacing. Nonetheless, the film quickly went on to become a box office blockbuster all around the world. The film was made for $125 million. It had an opening domestic box office weekend gross of $90,294,621. It’s total domestic gross was $317,575,550 and its foreign gross was $658,900,000, with a total worldwide gross of $976,475,550.
Members of London’s Great Ormond Street Hospital claimed that the Harry Potter novels were aiding patients both physically and emotionally. Lisa Lewer, a clinical nurse, noted, “Harry Potter’s predicaments are similar to the problems that face young people generally. Problems like dealing with the loss or separation from parents and family or the anxiety of forming new relationships inunfamiliar places. But the different ways Harry tackles them demonstrates to children that by exploring their own struggles they can often find ways of overcoming them.”
One of the praises offered to the first film was that it felt thoroughly British, even to the point of using British terms that Americans might not get. Emphasized director Chris Columbus, “I vowed to make the film as British as possible. Did they redub
A Hard Day’s Night
? Did they redub
A Man For All Seasons
? No, and we’re not going to do it with this one.”
Some American Harry fans were undaunted by the fact that
Sorcerer’s Stone
opened in Britain a week before it did so in America, going so far as to fly overseas for a screening.
In an interview with the BBC, Chris Columbus revealed a bit of information about
Chamber of Secrets
, noting that they had shot sequences involving a flying car and a giant spider.
J.K. Rowling used her considerable clout to raise awareness and funds to help fight child poverty, particularly in one-parent families. Said Rowling, “Lone parents and their children are the poorest groups in our society. We are a wealthy nation, yet we have one of the worst records of child poverty in the industrialized world. It is a scandal.”
Numerous interested parties had approached J.K. Rowling about stage rights to her novels, but the author has emphasized that she won’t even entertain such offers until, at the very earliest, 2007. As her agent Christopher Little told the newspaper the
Stage,
“We have had requests every week from all over the world in connection with the stage rights to
Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone
. It
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