Cursed Child Gives First Look at Harry, Ginny and Albus

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child reveals their actors in character, starting with portraits of the central family characters: Harry, Ginny and Albus.

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The Harry Potter and the Cursed Child production has done a heck of a job keeping which actors are playing what roles under wraps. But with only a week to go before the very first preview of Cursed Child Part 1, it’s time to start revealing what our characters look like in costume, and who is playing who, outside of the Golden Trio.

We caught a glimpse earlier of Jamie Parker as Harry in the behind the scenes video released last April. But now we have a full color portrait of him, as tweeted out by the production.

Behold: Harry Potter, at middle age:

The first thing that you note, of course, is the lack of wizard’s robes. Parker, speaking to Pottermore, explains.

"“He’s wearing a suit because he’s a Ministry man, but he’s not just a bloke in a suit, that’s way too anonymous. And it sounds strange but we talked around a lot of different suits, because there are suits and suits, and a lot of them we put on and we went “Mmm it’s just not right”. With all the character’s costumes we want them to be instantly familiar when people see them, so that people feel like the story’s safe in our hands, and that we’re taking that responsibility seriously.”"

As for the glasses and scar, Parker calls them “iconic,” and says that they were really the part that mattered. “You don’t need more than the scar and the glasses, you kind of go, “there it is.”

As for Ginny, we speculated hard when the cast was first announced that the actress who was arguably playing the most important adult character outside of our Big Three would be Poppy Miller. We are totally chuffed to have been right.

Miller is thrilled with being Ginny, and loves her adult version of the handmade sweaters Weasleys are famous for. “I think of it as a really tasteful Pygmy Puff.” She’s already awesome in my book. Rowling also told Pottermore she was pleased with Miller’s Ginny. “I think a lot of people would like to have Poppy’s Ginny for a mother. Kind and cool, exactly as I imagined her.”

And then….there’s Albus. It was hard picking out of the kids//young people in the cast who would be playing the titular character, especially because it was hard to know what age he would be exactly (especially once we saw the leak of a twenty something actor playing Scorpus Malfoy, who is supposedly the same age.) If he was cast as age 11, there was also the possibility of the part being double cast due to age restrictions.

It turns out they did not cast Albus young–the leak of Scorpius was the correct tip off to think older for the part. The part of Albus Severus Potter went to Sam Clemmett of Foyle’s War.

Blessedly *he* is wearing the more familiar Hogwarts wizard robes–which the actor says he’s 100% certain are hand me downs from older brother James.

"“This is what Albus wears at the start of the show. I had the idea he was wearing James’s – his older brother’s – hand-me-downs. So I wanted him to feel quite uncomfortable, and be able to play with his clothes.”"

Note he says “at the start of the show.” What is he by the end?

We are being promised more reveals to come all week, as the production slowly reveals who all the major characters are, and who is playing them.

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