Mary Gilmore, Staff Writer
The cast for the new HBO Harry Potter TV Series has been released. This cast brings a new take on the original “Harry Potter” movies and books.
The “Harry Potter” series was written by J.K. Rowling who produced seven books for the series. The books then became a hit movie franchise, creating eight movies based on the original books. For the TV show, every book Rowling wrote will be adapted into one season per book: “Sorcerer’s Stone,” “Chamber of Secrets,” “Prisoner of Azkaban,” “Goblet of Fire,” “Order of the Phoenix,” “Half-Blood Prince” and “Deathly Hallows.”
HBO auditioned over 32,000 children for the role of the main character, Harry Potter. Due to this high number of young actors, executive producer Mark Mylod stated that the casting team has to review between 500 and 1,000 audition tapes per day. This doesn’t include the casting for the other main children in the series, Hermione and Ron. As this auditioning process has been extremely difficult and time consuming, Harry, Hermione, and Ron’s casting has not been released yet.
The cast was released for many of the important side characters in the series. This cast includes John Lithgow as Album Dumbledore, Paapa Essiedu as Severus Snape, Janet McTeer as Professor McGonagall, Nick Frost as Hagrid, Paul Whitehouse as Argus Filch, and Luke Thallon as Quirinus Quirrell.
Lithgow is most notable for starring in the movie “Conclave”. He was also the voice actor for Lord Farquaad in “Shrek.” Esseidu was seen in “The Outrun” and other smaller films. McTeer is known for the 2016 movie “Me Before You.” Frost was seen in the English horror film, “Get Away.” Paul Whitehouse is famous for his role in the Halloween movie “Corpse Bride.” Luke Thallon is currently playing Hamlet for the Royal Shakespeare Company.
Paapa Esseidu, who will play Severus Snape, has fallen into some controversy because of his skin color. Esseidu is a Black man, yet Snape was a white man in the previous film adaptation. Snape was also explicitly described in the book series as a pale man. Unfortunately, the internet has not taken too kindly to this casting choice, with many Potter fans getting upset that the story would not feel authentic.
The controversy surrounding Paapa Esseidu’s casting stems from efforts to honor Alan Rickman’s legacy as Severus Snape, rather than simply recreating the character as seen in previous adaptations. Rickman played Snape in the original films and was beloved for how well he acted. He brought Snape from the books to life, portraying complex emotions of love and hate. Rickman’s passing in 2016 marked the end of an era for his portrayal of Snape, making it difficult to simply replicate his iconic performance in a new adaptation. To preserve his legacy, the series opted to reinvent the character, introducing a fresh and distinctive interpretation of Snape instead of attempting to directly replace Rickman’s version.
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