Yates, Staunton and Heyman Talk OOTP

The December edition of Empire Magazine includes an interesting article on Harry Potter and on the Order of the Phoenix in which director David Yates mentions the length of the movie: "The book's huge, but it actually distills quite easily. That said, I've shot a movie that's probably over three hours, so I'll have to lose 45 minutes in the edit."

In the article, we also learn that Imelda Staunton (who Plays Professor Umbridge) has apparently been wanting to be a part of the Harry Potter franchise for some time now. She quips: "Actually I was rather insulted they'd never asked," while producer David Heyman is quoted has saying that "She (Umbridge) is all smiles on the surface, but underneath, she's deadly."

Heyman had nothing but good words for Evanna Lynch, who plays Luna Lovegood in OOTP: "She's an obsessive Potter fan who'd actually had correspondence with Jo Rowling. When she was cast Jo rang me up because she just couldn't believe it - from her letters she said, 'She is Luna'."

Scans of the article are now up at DanRadcliffe.co.uk. You can see them here: Empire Magazine (1) (2) (3)

This all sounds wonderful... Except maybe the 'I'll have to lose 45 minutes of the film in edit'!