Rowling's influence
At one point in filming the "Order of the Phoenix," JK Rowling discovered the filmmakers cut out a particular character. She suggested they put him back. It was later revealed that dircetor David Yates and producer David Heyman wanted to leave Kreacher, the Black family house elf, out of the final cut.
Apparently Rowling didn't like that idea and suggested they put him back if they want the last movie to make any sense.
Rowling doesn't have a tremendous amount of influence in making the movies, Heyman said, but she is available to smooth over some of the sticky points in the process. The Kreacher decision is one example.
Another was explaining the Black family tree.
It became one of the more difficult scenes to translate into film, Heyman said during a press conference in England.
"She's there when we need her," Heyman said. "I called Jo up and said, 'Help.' Fifteen minutes later, this drawing arrived which was a family tree."
Rowling put together an illustration that explained five generations and 75 members of the Black family. It included birth dates, death dates, marriage dates and all sorts of information that proved invaluable in filming that scene.
Listen to Yates, Heyman and Goldenberg talk about some of the decisions they made in making "The Order of the Phoenix."
Choosing Imelda Staunton to play Dolores Umbridge:
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Deciding to keep one of the characters in the movie:
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Making "The Order of the Phoenix" a darker Harry Potter movie:
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Yates, Heyman and screenwriter Michael Goldenberg talked about some of the joys and hurdles they faced in filming the "Order of the Phoenix." They talked about making a scary movie for kids, choosing Imelda Staunton to play Dolores Umbridge and trying to tell the "Order of the Phoenix" as an emotional journey for Harry Potter.
Yates was asked if he was concerned about making a dark, scary movie that is supposed to appeal to young children. Yates responded with a question of his own.
"Did you never enjoy being scared when you were a kid?" Yates asked.
He said he loved being scared watching movies and TV shows when he was a child. And he thinks kids today like being scared too.
"It just makes them feel vital and alive," Yates said.
Heyman said kids are smarter than most want to believe.
"They like things that don't talk down to them," Heyman said.
He added that there is a literary tradition of writing scary stories for children. He pointed to Grimm fairy tales filled with children-earting witches and evil stepmothers. And he is not so convinced that the latest installment of Harry Potter is a dark story, as some suggest.
"The films are growing up. The books are growing up," Heyman said.
Choosing Staunton to play Dolores Umbridge, the Ministry appointed teacher of Defense Against the Dark Arts in the "Order of the Phoenix," was apparently a no-brainer. The conversation between Yates and Heyman lasted about two seconds in making that decision. It went something like:
Heyman: "How 'bout Staunton?"
Yates: "Great."
"It wasn't really a competition," Yates said. "We just knew."
Yates said he took particular pleasure in filming the scenes with Staunton, especially the ones in which Harry serves detention with Umbridge who "wants to cleanse him of his sins."
One of the challenges in making the "Order of the Phoenix" was what Yates described as "trying to provide a language for the end of the film because it's a very internal journey."
To make it more difficult, Goldenberg had to turn more than 800 pages of text into a two-hour movie to tell that journey.
"It wasn't as daunting as it might appear," Goldenberg said. "There's a lot of wonderful digressions, wonderful details, side journeys. It was a decision we made early on: the spine of it was going to be Harry's emotional journey."