The first 20 minutes of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child move at breakneck speed, setting up the story of the grown Harry Potter sending his son Albus to Hogwarts Academy with a series of impressionistic cut scenes that are a bit hard to follow for those of us not well-versed in the Potterverse. That’s a side effect of trimming a story told in more than five hours and two parts in London to a brisk two hours and 50 minutes in its first North American Tour, now playing at Broadway in Chicago’s Nederlander Theatre.
But stick around and you’ll soon be immersed in a cracking story of Albus and his best friend Scorpius Malfoy repeatedly traveling back in time in an attempt to right a wrong even as their fathers Harry and Draco try to save them from misadventures while repairing their badly damaged paternal relationships.
It’s the Butterfly Effect on steroids courtesy of a stolen time turner. You’ve seen this type of story before, but not with these characters–or these incredible practical effects that amp up the wow factor throughout. Onstage shape shifting, wands that throw bolts of fire and a rippling shimmer in the air whenever the friends travel in time are just the start of it. It’s like attending a slick Broadway play with a high-end magic show built in.
The crackerjack cast, led by Emmet Smith as Albus, Aidan Close as Scorpius and John Skelley as Harry, imbues this fantastical tale with the sheen of reality and the highest of emotional stakes. Larry Yando, the longtime Scrooge of the Goodman’s A Christmas Carol, plays multiple characters, most memorably a Severus Snape that builds on the late Alan Rickman’s film performances with an affecting mixture of sharp humor, menace and nobility. Other standouts include Ebony Blake as a girlboss Hermione Granger and Julia Nightingale as the mysterious Delphi Diggory.
Potter fans will be in heaven. For them and the rest of us, director John Tiffany delivers a spectacular night at the theater with illusions you’ll be trying to deconstruct long after the final bows.
Harry Potter and the Cursed Child runs through February 1 at Broadway in Chicago’s Nederlander Theatre.
For a full roundup of reviews of this show, visit Theatre in Chicago.
Photo by Matt Murphy
