HBO and the cursed child
Photo by Murray Close/ Getty Images
A new Harry Potter TV show is taking shape. It's going to air over ten years on HBO, starting in 2026; its three child leads were announced last week and by the time it's done they'll be in their early twenties, lives in tatters. So everyone says. 'Please protect these children from any evil adults that they encounter,' says one poster.
Hermione's new actress resembles the book character but is of ambiguous ethnicity; there are more commenters predicting floods of racist abuse than actually giving it out. A high-profile Harry Potter news account laments that their parents have 'thrust them' into 'JK Rowling's toxic sphere of influence;' Emma Watson's father has issued a stern warning to the new cast's families about the difficulties of childhood fame; a TV reporter at Metro has taken the cue to write how she is 'truly concerned about what will happen to the new Harry, Ron, and Hermione.'
Newly confirmed castmembers Arabella Stanton, Dominic McLaughlin, and Alastair Stout. Photograph by Courtesy of Aidan Monaghan/HBO
You can't even blame the onlookers for pre-empting a trauma story: the depths of human depravity surface so regularly in our popular culture that you can barely refer to them as 'depths' anymore. We seem to live in a very early Germanic fairy tale, with predators around every corner. There's a thriving market for 'misery lit,' those books that come with Elena Ferrante-style pastel covers but actually feature detailed and disturbing descriptions of child abuse. I'm Glad My Mom Died, an abuse memoir by ex-Nickolodeon star Jeanette McCurdy, has sold over two million copies; Netflix's executives seem obsessed with running documentaries about the sordid depths of children's TV and the kidfluencer sphere. Audiences are no longer satisfied by news reports; traumatic events must get verbal or thespian play-by-plays, as in HBO's Leaving Neverland and the BBC's Jimmy Savile drama The Reckoning. The trauma-seeking impulse seems even stronger the further you go back: you can make thousands on YouTube uploading videos with titles like 'Disturbing Horrors Behind Shirley Temple That'll RUIN Your Childhood.'
This obsession did not always exist. It didn't have to because Hollywood used to be interesting. There were stars and their stock characters, a network of in-house 'fan magazines', the industry worked like a soap opera. This system mostly died out with the stars themselves. There is no grand narrative anymore: Hollywood is staffed by independent contractors and filled with bits of blind gossip that diverge from each other Rashomon-style. The best way to make meaning out of this fragmented industry is by searching for abuse and trauma. To howl about the 'evil adults' lurking on the banks of Hollywood's Styx. We're in a depression, but there can never be another Shirley Temple to dance us out of it; the culture industries that used to hold people in thrall are now under permanent suspicion.
The online commenters have it twisted. Hollywood is obsessed with its Lindsay Lohans and Amanda Bynseses, but you never hear about the child stars who haven't been scarred; well-adjusted adults do nothing for the larger narrative. The original three actors made it to adulthood seemingly unscathed and accessed opportunities that would have likely been off-limits without their cultural cache; you can't automatically predict that the new cast will go off the rails, and you can't blame the parents for setting their talented children up for life. In the age of national pessimism it is cheering to see a British cultural property spawning multiple generations of celebrities. We should suspend our disbelief and be happy for them.
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