Today is the 18th anniversary of the U.K. pub date of the first Harry Potter book. To celebrate, J.K. Rowling, who’s currently in the midst of working on the Harry Potter spinoff film, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (starring Eddie Redmayne, Katherine Waterston and potentially Ezra Miller), just announced an upcoming stage production titled Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, which will explore the “untold part” of the wizard’s young life.
The play, which will be performed at the Palace Theatre in Summer 2016, is interestingly being written by Jack Thorne and directed by John Tiffany, the writer/director team behind the National Theatre of Scotland’s Let the Right One In. J.K. Rowling is, as you may have noted, not Jack Thorne, and therefore didn’t write the play — but she collaborated with him on the story. Imogen Heap — of Frou Frou and of your high school depression — will score the production.
Rowling didn’t reveal much, as she didn’t “want to spoil what I know will be a real treat for fans,” but she addressed the obvious question of why she didn’t write it as a new novel, saying, “I am confident that when audiences see the play they will agree that it was the only proper medium for the story.”
The producers said that the play would feature “some of our favourite characters from the Harry Potter books,” and that “this new work will offer a unique insight into the heart and mind of the now legendary young wizard.” And rumor has it that it “delves into what happened to Harry’s parents — Lily Evans Potter and James Potter — before they were killed by Lord Voldemort, forcing an infant Harry to be raised in miserable circumstances by his mother’s sister, Petunia, her horrid husband Vernon and their spoiled son Dudley.”