Warner Bros wants to make more Harry Potter movies with JK Rowling’s involvement

Warner Bros Discovery CEO David Zaslav has suggested the company will try and make more Harry Potter sequels – with JK Rowling’s involvement.

The company produced eight Harry Potter films between 2001 and 2011, starting with Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone and ending with Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2.

In the years since the saga ended, Warner Bros has also produced three films in the spin-off franchise Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, also with Rowling on board.

However, amid underwhelming box office returns and controversy behind the scenes involving members of its cast, the franchise was seemingly abandoned after this year’s Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore.

During an investors’ call on Friday, Zaslav said (per The Hollywood Reporter) that the company was going to “focus on franchises” going forward.

“We haven’t had a Superman movie in 13 years. We haven’t done a Harry Potter in 15 years. The DC movies and the Harry Potter movies provided a lot of the profits for Warner Bros… over the past 25 years.”

(It’s not clear exactly what Zaslav meant by these figures; the final Harry Potter film came out 11 years ago, while Superman adaptation Man of Steel hit cinemas in 2013.)

Zaslav then apparently pointed out that Warner Bros still owns the cinematic rights to Lord of the Rings, before returning to the idea of a Harry Potter sequel, “if we can do something with JK going forward”.

Several of the cast of Harry Potter have also expressed an interest in potentially reprising their roles in a hypothetical sequel.

In an interview with The Independent last month, Draco Malfoy star Tom Felton was asked about the prospect of a return to the role, responding: “I’d be lying if I said I wouldn’t consider it.

“I definitely don’t miss Draco Malfoy, but I am very affectionately linked to him,” he added.