“Cursed Child” Producer Sonia Friedman Says Younger Boyfriend Helps Relate to Younger Audiences

At 52, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child producer Sonia Friedman is a bit older than many Potter fans (not all of us, of course). But in a recent interview with BBC Radio 4, Friedman revealed one of the things that help her understand younger audiences: She has a boyfriend about 20 years younger than her!

I love seeing the world through his eyes, and it certainly makes me better at my job because I’m aware of a younger generation’s interests, politics, and struggles as well as my own.

Makes sense – nothing wrong with bridging generational gaps in adult relationships if it makes us all understand one another a bit better!

Theatre producer Sonia Friedman at the Duke of York Theatre. Photo Credit: Matt Writtle

She also explained her personal connection with the Cursed Child story, in which Harry and his son Albus have difficulty relating to each other. Friedman, the youngest of four children, had no relationship with her own father, who abandoned her family before she was born.

I will never understand what it would be like to have a dad, and so I’m always looking for stories that might help me understand.

Though she is not a writer herself, Friedman says that thanks to her own background experiences, her talents lie in encouraging others to communicate emotion.

I wish I could write, I wish I could sing, I wish I could compose, I wish I could paint – I can’t do those things, but I seem to have an ability to tap into what other people want to hear and see and feel.

During the radio show, Friedman also chose pieces of music to play, one of which was “Hide and Seek” by Imogen Heap, who composed and arranged the music for Cursed Child. She explained how the song influenced the production:

John Tiffany, the director of ‘Harry Potter and the Cursed Child’… played me this piece of music as an example of what the emotion at the center of the play [was] going to be. So this piece of music will always be incredibly important to me.

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child has recently started performances with its new cast on London’s West End, and it will be heading to Broadway next spring.