PotterCast 157: No... Don't Even Ask Transcript

News Talk (0:00 - 11:11)

Melissa Anelli (MA): Okay. Hello. Welcome PotterCast One-Five-Seven here. And we are your PotterCast Nimnits, Nimwits, Dimwits.

Sue Upton (SU): Hey!

MA: I was going to say something else but it got stuck in my mouth (SU laughs) 'cause this is a PG-13 show. Okay, welcome. This is PotterCast. I'm Melissa. I'm here with John and Frak and Sue. And, we have another great and funny (laughs) week of Potter theories, discussion and Tom Foolery. Heavy on the tomfoolery this week, right?

John Noe (JN): (laughs) Of course. As always.

MA: Yeah. So, let's hear a little from our friends at Audible.com and then we'll be back with the news. Okay, we'll just put in Sue's from last week.

SU: Suzie Suzie what's in the newsie? (laughs) There's a lot of numbers. You remember how last week we heard about 800 words? Well that was from the 800 word prequel, which drew a lot of traffic. In fact, 70,000 visitors went to the Waterstone's J.K.R. prequel during the first twenty hours.

JN: Dang!

MA: Oh, that's nothing for Harry Potter fans. (SU: I know.) That's nothing! Waterstone's is all excited, we're like, "Pff." (SU laughs) No, no, no, that's fantastic. But seriously, it's not surprising from this fandom.

SU: I know. I know.

JN: It was only 70,000?

SU: Only 70- on the first twenty hours online.

JN: That's like what PotterCast downloads in a week.

SU: (laughs) I don't know about that dude. But the prequel is going to be printed in that special book that will go to charities and it is available via Waterstones.com. And it will be printed on August 7th. And they do ship internationally. It's not very expensive at all, so it all goes to charity.

JN: Do you think they're going to release a typed version of this.

SU: A what, John? (laughs) (FF: A typed version?) I don't know. That's a good question. I don't know. I would hope so.

JN: No offence to Jo my handwriting is terrible, but there is a couple of words I had a hard time reading.

MA: I don't have a hard time making out a couple, but there were a couple of key words that were hard, really hard to grasp. And, I know a lot of people thought the same.

SU: Well, I don't know. Maybe they will because if it is they're hoping to have so many international readers that they would need it to be more clear for people that English isn't their first language. So, they might do it, but at this point we don't know. So, it's a good question. I don't know. Speaking of books, guess how many Harry Potter books have been sold worldwide now. Just guess.

JN: A billion.

Frankie Franco III (FF): Hm. Twenty-four.

SU: Ee! No. It's a little bit low on that one. It's 400,000,000 books have now been sold.

FF: Four hundred million books?

JN: Jeez!

MA: Yeah, that's crazy, huh?

FF: Gosh!

SU: Of the Harry Potter books. Four hundred million are floating around that people have boughten.

JN: Of all seven of them? Like one through seven?

SU: Of all seven.

MA: What suprises me is that we sort of knew it was coming. We sort of knew that this milestone would be reached, but it was only a few months ago that I checked and it was like 350, 370, something like that. That that many people that are still buying these books at this rate is incredible. (SU: Yeah. I know.) I mean it's been what? It's been ten years. (SU: Ten years.) Jeez, people.

SU: Ten years. This weekend that this podcast will come out, then the five-year anniversary of when Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix was released, too. Everytime a movie comes out. Yeah, it's true.

FF: Well, I have friends who just started reading the books a couple months ago. And they read them all. So, the fan base is growing and growing.

SU: Yeah.

MA: Isn't today the 21st?

SU: Tomorrow. June 20th. Tomorrow.

MA: Tomorrow? Oh, so tomorrow's the day.

SU: Isn't that amazing? Five years. Makes you feel old. (laughs) At least me does. I don't know, maybe not you.

FF: Wow, then I got in that- oh, nevermind. Azkaban came out that year didn't it?

SU: No.

MA: No, 2003 is Order of the Phoenix.

FF: No, I mean the movie. I'm sorry.

MA: Oh, the movie's 2004.

FF: Oh, then I came on a year after.

MA: So, we're still pre-dating you.

SU: So, you're a young pup.

FF: I liked the books I just didn't read them because I thought, "I don't have time to read. De, de, de." And, so I had friends who read the books. This one girl who used to work at Erin Brothers. She used to read them and I used to tell, make her tell me about chapter by chapter as she read them when we unloaded the inventory truck. 'Cause I figured, "I'm never going to get to read them, but I really want to know what they're about 'cause I really like all the movies." And, then I finally broke down and read them. And, I'm very glad I did.

MA: (laughs) Well, so are we!

JN: Yeah, thank God.

MA: We're glad it worked out and you read them, Frak. 'Cause otherwise we would not know each other. (FF: Oh, my God!) Oh, my God!

FF: You would have been Frakless. Talk amongst yourselves. (MA: Okay.) I cannot see the Potter nor Cast! I'm just kidding.

MA: Aw, gosh. Okay, what else is happening, Suse?

SU: Well, not only is Frak someone who likes the books. You know who else likes them? Actor Daniel Craig. James Bond loves the Harry Potter books. (FF: 'Cause he's awesome!) Yes. And, how do we know this? 'Cause he's pretty cool. He was in, there was a charity auction held in London recently and he got into a bidding war with actor Hugh Grant, of all people, for an uncorrected proof of Philosopher's Stone. (JN laughs)

MA: What? Can you believe that?

FF: That's so cool for both of them.

MA: How much did they end up paying for it?

SU: It was almost thirty-six thousand U.S. dollars, (JN: Wow.) which is like fifteen thousand pounds, which is thirty-six or thirty-seven U.S. dollars. (JN: Not too bad.) Okay, I'll just drop that, okay, no problem. (JN laughs) Nope.

MA: Ridiculous. (FF and SU: They're fans.) They're fans. That's a lot of money to pay for...

SU: Neither of them have children.

MA: A kid doesn't care about an uncorrected proof to be honest I don't think.

SU: Right. But I think that's really cool. It benefited the television school in the U.K. where David Yates went to.

JN: Oh, that's pretty cool.

MA: All right, so what else is happening Sue, with the news?

SU: (sings) We have music, we have Tonys, we have Dan Radcliffe on Broadway.

JN: Dan Radcliffe news?

SU: Yeah, yeah, him and- Mr. Radcliffe and- Dan Radcliffe and Mr. Richard Giffiths presented at the Tony Awards which were just fabulous, fabulous, fabulous. (MA: Yeah, I heard.) Richard Griffiths came out and then Dan was with him and you could tell that Dan was a little bit nervous but Richard made a little bit of a joke, because the couldn't get the- when you go to present an award the envelopes are sealed and a lot of the times, in this case it was like a book and it was- it had a sticker on it, and Dan went to go help him with it and he goes, "There, just like magic." So it was a little bit of a nod (JN laughs) to Harry. (FF: That's cute.) It was kind of hokey but it was kind of cute. (MA: Okay...) If you- for those of you who are collecting at home, it's really kind of neat, Harry Potter was on the cover of Entertainment Weekly magazine. They have their one thousandth issue and they are celebrating a lot of the one thousand new or 100 new classics and Goblet of Fire was actually their number two book.

FF: Goblet of Fire? Wow.

SU: I know.

MA: Yeah.

JN: Why Goblet of Fire?

MA: What was number one?

SU: You know? I don't know. They said- (MA: Is that because- oh, I'm sorry.) no, go ahead.

MA: Oh, just because the first three they said were kid's stuff and then unexpectedly Jo went dark and killed children and sent Harry off to war and brought Voldemort back. (FF: Oh, I see, I get that.) Which I get why, I get what they are saying that, but I don't agree. I don't think- Jo said once, "You know, the series started with a double murder, what did people think was going to happen?"

SU: Right.

FF: But it was a double murder in the past.

MA: Yeah, but (makes scoffing noise) a double murder. You know what I mean? Yeah. Anyway, I don't know, I thought the books were as dark as- (SU: Yeah.) cutting in. (SU: Yeah.) I mean the image of Voldemort sucking on the unicorn in the woods, in Book One, blegh.

FF: (laughs) Was kind of gross.

SU: I would have picked Half-Blood Prince personally if it were me. But Cedric's death was also one of the great deaths, one of the classic deaths. (MA: That's true.) Which is bizarre.

MA: I think I would pick Deathly Hallows, honestly. (SU and JN: Yeah.) Well I don't know, if you are talking about a classic maybe it would be all the way back to Sorcerer's Stone just because of what it started.

FF: Yeah, I would run on that to. I do see your point though, it did crank up a notch a little bit with Four, but I think the story- I would argue that Three is where it really took- it really soared. The story was so sophisticated there. Especially with the reveal- one of the characters, the whole time was a doppelganger. Whoa, that rat was a murderer these three years? (SU: Mm-hm.) That was a big reveal.

MA: Yeah. (JN: Yeah.) Is that all for the news?

SU: No, there's one more thing. Please vote! Wrock style, Wizard Rock style.

MA: Right. Do it! (FF: Wizard Rock style.) Harry Potter Alliance has started Wizard Rock the Vote. It's an organization that will help- it's an effort that will help you get registered to vote all summer this summer. So, if you are old enough to vote and go to a Wizard Rock concert, and they are happening all over the country this summer, you will find a friendly Harry Potter Alliance volunteer who will help you register. They will not help you pick a candidate to vote for. They will not. (JN laughs) They will help you register and then you make the choice yourself. (SU: Yes.) Right? (FF: Yes.) Do it.

JN: Just don't vote for Voldemort.

FF: Just don't vote for Voledmort. (laughs)

MA: Right, don't vote for Voldemort. We don't care if you vote for John McCain, or if you vote for Senator Obama, or if you vote for Ralph Nader, or if you vote for anybody else or- I guess they don't do write ins- but, just vote, just vote.

SU: Ernie Macmillan! Vote for Ernie Macmillan! (FF laughs) (JN: Charlie Brown!) Sorry, had to get that Hufflepuff in there somehow.

MA: Yeah. But there's a video on Leaky. It's called Wrock the Vote video that the Harry and the Potters did. I don't know, I'm really thrilled they're doing this because as we know Jo said something about this in her Harvard Commencement address, she said- (FF: Mm-hm, that was so good.) yeah. She said- she was addressing a group of people who were mostly United States citizens and said, "The way you vote, the way you protest, the way you act has an affect on the world, so this is important, it is important to everybody in the world." (JN: That's true.) So let's do it! Let's make your voice heard.

SU: Yay! Okay.

MA: Okay?

SU: I think that's good.

MA: I said we're out!

SU: Yes, out this week and onto other stuff, right?

MA: Other stuff coming up right now.

FF: Apparate out! Crack!