In the post-performance Q&A today, Peter Boal had a piece of paper with the first and second (where applicable) cast lists for "Harry Potter: The Ballet" as envisioned by the dancers. Boal said it wouldn't be produced while he was running the company, but then reconsidered with, "well, if the economy gets that bad..."

He didn't read the full list, but gave a few snippets. Perhaps by the end of the season, we'll get the full cast. So far...

Harry Potter: James Moore (first cast), Jonathan Porretta (second cast)
Lord Voldemort: Olivier Wevers
Dumbledore: Otto Neubert
Draco Malfoy: Josh Spell
One of the two of Malfoy's muscle sidekicks: Jordan Pacitti

He didn't get specific, but said all of the redheads would play Weasleys. (Bummer: Rachel Foster would make a great Ginny Weasley.)

I'm still in favour of 'Twilight'. 'Twilight' is even located in Seattle, isn't it? Should be the obvious choice for PNB.

I fear "Northern Exposure: The Ballet", or "Twin Peaks: The Ballet"

Helene, I'm afraid you're dating yourself. I don't think 'Northern Exposure' or 'Twin Peaks' will bring in the younger demographic...

I know: 'Café Nervosa', in which dancers act out various scenes from 'Frasier'. Imagine what Tudor could have done with Niles and Daphne!

You guys are killing me! I'm thinking Stroman, though, for "Frasier". I don't think Tudor would have had much patience for Niles' puppy-dogged-ness.

If they're going for a younger demographic, maybe they need High School Musical -18 (or whatever number they're on now)- The Ballet. Or maybe they need to pull in boys and they could do "Halo- The Ballet."

Twilight is located in Forks. I can imagine the pas de deux with Bella and Edward in the field and Edward reveals his sparkly skin in the sunlight.

Twin Peaks is way too complicated for a ballet!

High School Musical as a ballet!

Or we could be truly demented and do...

Moves: The Musical

There should be a warning on threads like this:

"Caution -- do not read while drinking coffee. Unless you have a roll of paper towels nearby."

If Matthew Bourne can make a ballet for topiary in Edward Scissorhands, I think he could easily manage a Harry Potter ballet.

It's hard to make the call here, though. Vampire ballets do seem to be very successful at the box office, but I think the Potter franchise has a wider appeal.

And the local library had a Twilight v Harry Potter debate this weekend -- which series was better written, more interesting, etc.

Potter v Twilight smackdown

There's no doubt that Rowling is the superior writer and HP the better series, but I think Twilight would make a better ballet. Twilight can do without dialogue (in fact, the story may even be improved without it as evidence of the wretched screenplay written for the movie). Not sure you could do the same with HP. Rowling would probably demand all British casting.

No kidding -- in Harry Potter, almost everyone is an in-law

Oh ouch!



Thinking about this seriously (if that's possible with the jokes here...) you are probably right. I haven't seen the film (am slogging through the books right now, trying to see what the fuss is about) but I can imagine that the ideas are more powerful than the language they are conveyed by. It's been very interesting to think about Wheeldon's Carousel ballet and its relationship to the musical. In some ways, the references in the ballet to the original text are the weakest things about it -- we see the difference in the two main characters in their movement styles. "Billy" is something of a bully and "Julie" is unnerved by her sexuality -- how they interact and how they change each other is the fundamental story here. The specifics of New England and traveling carnivals are so tangential to this as to be almost a distraction. Rowling's complex wizarding world needs almost all of the seven books to unfold itself for us -- a ballet that tries to encompass that mass of detail would need to be as long as the Mahabarata. Twilight is much simpler, and with its built-in system of references (to Shakespear, to other vampire sagas) it almost tells itself.