Emma Thompson is saying she won’t return as Trelawney for Deathly Hallows, being more invested in her own Nanny McPhee films.
I think this is quite unfortunate. Emma Thomson is a great actress (I was just going on about her earlier today to some co-workers, actually), and she made a good Trelawney.
So who gets cast as Trelawney for Deathly Hallows? Or is she just written out of the rest of the story? She’s not exactly a fundamental character in the seventh book. (I’m still baffled they decided to take her out of Half-Blood Prince, though.) Thoughts? Reactions?
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Not baffled at all. They seem to cut out most stuff that would help explain the deeper meanings to what’s going on. Saw OOTP on Sunday & am still baffled that they couldn’t show more clearly how Snape was a member of the Order & his role as a spy.
It also seemed like Thompson wasn’t really too interested in coming back as Trelawney. Was more invested in the Nancy Mcphee stories, whatever those are.
You haven’t seen Nanny McPhee? You’re in a for a treat. Thompson wrote and starred in a movie based on the Nurse Matilda stories by Christianna Brand, about a very ugly nanny who takes on the exceedingly naughty Brown children. The trick is that with each lesson they learn, Nanny grows less ugly, until at the end she is as attractive as they are well behaved. There is a line which makes me cry each time I hear Thompson say it:
When you don’t want me, but need me, I will stay. When you want me, but don’t need me, I must go.
I do like Nanny McPhee, but the way she said it made it sound like she was the creator of the story.
I don’t know, for me, her reasons for not wanting to do the last two movies sounds a bit snotty, like she’s above doing something where she isn’t the main star or the writer or something. And I’ve always liked Emma Thompson, but she tarnished her image with that one. It seems that all the other big name stars who end up with minor parts (some of which should be major), manage to schedule their time to do the filming for HP while they are still working on their bigger projects.
I’ve no idea who they might get. Emma Thompson never looked like my image of Trelawney, but she did capture the character quite well. Oh wait. I do know who looks the way I imagined Trelawney. Angela Pleasence was in a film with Rickman, “The Search for John Gissing”, and in that movie, she looked like Trelawney. However, it’s not at all the way they had Emma Thompson as Trelawney.
Well, at least she’s telling them now.
Pat
I adore Emma Thompson: her intelligence, her sense of balance and self-assurance and graceful gravitas. If she were a man, she would have made an excellent Dumbledore. I think she does a fine job as Trelawney.
On the other hand, Trelawney is such a caricature, so full of mannerisms and so eccentric in her appearance, as to be a stereotype: ditzy medium. Given that, any semi-competent actress should be able to do a convincing job of playing the role.
Mind, I remember saying that about Dumbledore, that the role of powerful but benign Headmaster was such a stereotyped one that any stage-trained competent British actor of a certain age could fill the role admirably.
I was wrong.
Well, the difference is that Dumbledore turns out to be more than a stereotype, and Trelawney remains one to the end, even when she is throwing the crystal balls, she’s still the ditzy medium. Dumbledore’s character has much more depth.
Pat
I don’t know…. maybe the truth is that she is embarrassed by the crappiness of the HP movies.
That’s what I’ve been thinking too, Pauli.
The movies may or may not be “crappy”. I think that would depend on one’s expectations and standards. We can argue that. But I don’t think there’s any denying the quality of the acting that’s going on in those movies: Richard Harris, Gary Oldman, Brendan Gleeson, Maggie Smith, Alan Rickman, Ralph Fiennes, Robert Hardy, Julie Walters, Jason Isaacs, Robbie Coltrane, Imelda Staunton, Helena Bonham Carter. It’s a list of who’s-who on the British acting scene, and a list most actors are delighted to join. And before anyone points out that they’re all in it for the money, I would like to point out that that is immaterial: mercenary or not, these folk are all doing a great job, and giving value for the money. So much so, that the exceptions (actually, the singular exception) stands out by contrast.
The actors can perform amazingly and still end up in a dud film. I’m sure some of the HP actors love the material and the stories but that’s not enought to make the movies good.
Do actors with standards starve?
Wait, was she cut from HBP or did she decline? If she was cut from that film, where she played a much more important role in the unravelling of the plot than in DH where her appearance is just in passing, then who could could blame her?