‘Harry Potter’ Max Series Pitches Are Underway, New Report Reveals Some Names
Work on the Max Harry Potter series is currently underway, but it’s still in the very early stages. Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav announced that the streaming service would be developing a long-running adaptation of the JK Rowling novels, and it looks like everyone is rolling up their sleeves.
Deadline is reporting that the first round of pitches took place in LA this week, with a few names involved. The list included, among others, Martha Hillier, Kathleen Jordan, Tom Moran, and Michael Lesslie. Apparently, the top choices will go on to the second round in the UK. Rowling will be involved with the final decision, but it’s unclear to the trade if she’s been briefed on the early stages.
It won’t have to be only one writer, Deadline notes, as Max could be looking at more than one showrunner. They also noted that they are open to the idea of multiple shows set in the Wizarding World. Of course, it’s all early days. It will be another two years minimum before they are even ready to start shooting, and that is if they don’t cancel the whole thing before then. It’s going to be, by far, the most ambitious undertaking in the history of the network/streaming service, and either they go all in, or it won’t be worth it. They might realize at some point that it’s not worth it.
Of course, instead of axing the whole idea, they could morph the Harry Potter series into a less challenging idea, like exploring new stories from the Wizarding World that don’t require casting a 10-year-old cast and keeping them around for 10 years to make the biggest TV series in history. A pitch I’ve been making for years: Do the history of how Hogwarts was built, focus on how Salazar Slytherin, Rowena Ravenclaw, Godric Gryffindor, and Helga Hufflepuff founded the 1,000-year-old school. A story of friendship and betrayal that hasn’t been fully explored and that has a lot of potential — also one everyone will want to see.
Stay tuned as the situation continues to develop.
Miguel Fernández is a Spanish student that has movies as his second passion in life. His favorite movie of all time is The Lord of the Rings, but he is also a huge Star Wars fan. However, fantasy movies are not his only cup of tea, as authors like Scorsese, Fincher, Kubrick or Hitchcock have been an obsession for him since he started to understand the language of filmmaking. He is that guy who will watch a black and white movie, just because it is in black and white.
