Magical Harry Potter performance

After a long wait, Hamburg and the German-speaking fan community can rejoice: the award-winning play "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child" can be seen live at the Theatre at the Grossmarkt.

Anyone who read the last work in the famous Harry Potter series "The Deathly Hallows" by J.L. Rowlings in 2007 could rest easy for many years in the certainty that evil in the wizarding world had been defeated with the fall of You-Know-Who. Actually...

Because where there seems to be no more danger in the future, the same cannot necessarily be said about the past. Remember the device Hermione used in the third instalment ("Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban") to make her impossible timetable possible? That's right, a time reverser. You can probably already guess the dangers that could lie dormant in such a magical artefact.

What if suddenly everything that lies in the past no longer necessarily remains there? A small change has a dramatic effect on the present? And none other than Harry Potter's son, who is friends with the son of Harry's former arch-enemy Draco Malfoy, is to blame? Then it gets exciting.

The eighth volume of the saga revolves around this storyline, which was published as a script in book form one day after the premiere of the play on 30 July 2016 at the Palace Theatre in London's West End. The story thus ties in with a literary world that began 19 years ago with the publication of the first work "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" in 1997.

Anyone who wants to experience the theatre production by British screenwriter Jack Thorne, author of the Harry Potter books J.K. Rowling, and director John Tiffany live will have to travel (far): to Broadway in New York, to Melbourne, to San Francisco or at least to London's West End. English language skills required. For this unique piece of theatre, the Theatre at the Grossmarkt has been extensively converted to offer fans of the magical world a very special experience in listed architecture.

When Harry steps onto the stage of Hamburg's largest theatre near the Grossmarkthallen, the once stocky boy with the green eyes and wispy hair that we know from the books and films will be almost unrecognisable. If it weren't for the unmistakable scar, of course.

After all, he is now a 37-year-old family man with three children, working in what is probably a fairly normal (though certainly not 9-to-5) job in the Ministry of Magic's Law Enforcement Department.

The play begins where the books ended many years ago: Platform 9 ¾ at Kings Cross station in London. The Potters are saying goodbye to their first-born James Sirius (3rd year) and Albus Severus, who is due to board the Hogwarts Express for the first time this year.

At school, Albus Severus, named after Albus Dumbledore and Severus Snape, has some pretty big shoes to fill. After all, his parents succeeded in liberating the wizarding and Muggle world from the ultimate villain, Voldemort. No wonder the young Potter offspring doesn't always have it easy and struggles with the reputation of his famous family.

So what can he do to finally be in the limelight? The supposed opportunity presents itself when the father of Cedric Diggory, who died in Part 4, asks Harry to undo the tragedy that occurred during the Triwizard Tournament with the help of a time reversal device. When Harry refuses - after all, he knows the risks that playing with time can entail - the two boys, Albus Severus and his best friend Scorpius, Malfoy's son, see their chance to prove themselves. A chain of unforeseen events takes its course and peace is once again in grave danger.

The play should be enjoyed by both long-grown Harry Potter fans and their children (> 10 years), as well as those new to magic. This is because the realisation, including dance interludes and impressive stage tricks, is thoroughly successful.

Specific prior knowledge from books 1-7 is not necessary (but certainly helpful) in order to follow the plot of the theatre play, as a coherent and self-contained story is told. Just let the "Potterheads" in your circle of friends or family fill you in.