Tom Felton talks the hidden gems of Diagon Alley and who he wants to play in a “Harry Potter” remake
In a new interview with Buzzfeed, Tom Felton dished on all things Harry Potter, including the brand new Diagon Alley expansion of the the Wizarding World of Harry Potter and who he wants to play in a remake of the magical movie series.
First, Tom was asked about the Wizarding World of Harry Potter – Diagon Alley:
Do you know of any hidden gems in Universal’s Diagon Alley that fans should look out for?
Tom Felton: I haven’t really explored them all myself, but yeah, everything seems to move or do something or scare the wits out of you; it’s really cool. I’m used to everything being bolted down or super glued to the walls, so you can’t pick it up and touch it, but they haven’t spared anything. Even now, we can hear our little bird friend in the Vanishing Cabinet. So yeah, they do lots of cool little touches that will keep fans happy for hours. I’ve been here six hours, and I feel like I’ve only scratched the surface.
What advice would you give to a kid coming to the park for the first time?
TF: Take your time. Turn your cameras off; turn your phones off. Just walk around, and soak it all in. This is the only place in the world where you can actually imagine what it would be like as a Muggle leaving King’s Cross and turning up in Diagon Alley. I think kids and adults alike should turn their minds off for a second and soak it all in.
There [were] a lot of green screens on the Harry Potter set when filming. Is there something you’ve seen in the park so far that has blown you away?
TF: Yeah, Gringotts, for example, was in about four or five different pieces in London, and it was nowhere near that big either. So the fact now a) you can see it and b) you can walk into the doors of it… it’s very cool. A lot of people don’t realize that the sets didn’t link up with each other; they’re in separate parts of locations. It kind of made it hard to join the dots together of how things interconnected, but that’s what’s so amazing about this. You get to actually walk from Diagon Alley into Knockturn Alley and see it how it was written in the books.
Later in the interview, talk turned to the current Hollywood trend of remaking beloved franchises:
So with films like Star Wars and Star Trek… these movies have been remade. Do you think Harry Potter will be remade within your lifetime?
TF: Well, it’s inevitable, isn’t it? I suppose there will be a 4D, scratch-and-sniff version of it sooner or later. My only hope is that I’ll be old enough to play Lucius.
So you would make a cameo?
TF: Oh, 100%, yeah; it’s very dear to my heart. I’d come back as a wizarding extra in the background if they asked me, so yeah, hopefully one day.
Tom, who is currently starring in the TNT series Murder in the First, also talked about the difference between filming movies and TV shows, saying,
I don’t think there’s a preference, but it’s definitely different. For something like Harry Potter for example, we had a lot of time to make it perfect — which was great — but it also means we could have a slightly slower pace when filming. We do about eight or nine pages in the TV world, which is really cool and keeps you on your toes, I think. The quality of TV now seems to be getting better and better. I think if there ever was a prestige in film, it’s long gone. […] It’s very hard to get a strong emotional point across sometimes within a couple of hours [like a movie], so to do it over a whole TV series can make audiences even more involved and even more invested.
You can read the entire interview here.
What do you think of seeing Tom portray Lucius Malfoy in a Harry Potter remake? Would you love to see him as another Malfoy villain, or would you rather see him branch out and play a member of the Order of the Phoenix? Tell us your ideas in the comments!