Directing the Boy Wizard Part One

By: CHRIS WYATT
Date: Saturday, November 17, 2001

Chris Columbus has seen lots of success in the course of his career. The director has received critical acclaim and huge box office grosses for a string of family friendly hits, including HOME ALONE, MRS. DOUBTFIRE, and NINE MONTHS. But nothing he's done before (or that anyone's done before) has prepared him for the phenomenon that is HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER'S STONE.

And yet, at one point in his career, Columbus nearly decided against ever doing a big budget genre movie. "I initially didn't want to do a film like this because of the effects," says the director, "I just wasn't interested in working with them." What made him change his mind? Well for one, who could say "no" to the world's favorite wizard? But also, Columbus decided that "visual effects are at such a point where it's actually fun to work with [them]."



Certainly Potter fans the world over should be thankful to have a director who puts effects in their proper perspective. "You shouldn't let the effects overtake the story," says Columbus, "I've seen it happen in so many films... Our goal in HARRY was to make it... about the characters. The effects are icing on the cake."

Warner Brothers, who is making the HARRY POTTER films, was so pleased with Columbus' work that they already have him signed on for the next film in the series. "In the initial conversation with Warner Brothers they did say, 'Could you do two back to back,' and I said, 'I think so, as long as I get the editing [of the first film] worked out with the pre-production [of the second]." In order to accommodate the back-to-back shooting, Columbus began editing HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER'S STONE while it was still in production.

As of right now, two effects-heavy sequences from the second film, HARRY POTTER AND THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS, have already been completed. Like the first movie, the sequel will follow the book closely. "It's extremely faithful to the book," Columbus affirms, "with a few little added surprises here and there."



The director knew that Potter fans are so passionate about the books that they would expect something special from his films. "I said to my cinematographer and production designer, 'We need to push this film visually beyond anything that I've ever done,' and then I told the actors, 'Your performances have to be incredibly real, naturalistic. It's got to be real.'"

Columbus believed that this realism would be vital to the production. "It would have been easy to take this into some fantastical place that exists only in the imagination, but I felt that [in] the books Joe [J.K.] Rowling spoke to every eleven-year-old and said, 'You know, you could potentially get a letter from Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry.' That's what I want the film to be like, that you could actually, potentially get this letter."

"You want to make them believe in magic," the directors confides.

One of Columbus' main concerns during the production was for the lives of his child actors. "I've been reading British press for months, so I know that they can be brutal, but at the same time it seems... there's some respect for these kids, and letting them live their lives," he says. "We had a press conference where I asked the British press to please let these kids try to live a normal life outside of making this film. Hopefully, they'll continue to follow that."

Having directed HOME ALONE, Columbus was close to Macaulay Culkin when the child actor's fame began to damage his personal life. Because of that experience Columbus is very sensitive to how his film will change its young stars. "I've learned from that experience that you [also] have to cast the parents; you have to see what kind of environment the kids live in."



"These kids were very real and very honest," continues Columbus, "no stage mothers or stage fathers telling them to act like stars. These kids realize that they're doing a job." The director finds that this professional approach toward acting seems to be the norm in England. "I found that for British actors, even with the stars like Richard Harris and Maggie Smith, it's not about how big your trailer is. Not 'Do I have a trainer, do I have a cook?' It's all that star stuff that is so upsetting to me when I work in Hollywood."

Be sure to check back tomorrow for part two of CINESCAPE's interview with Chris Columbus.