(This contains spoilers of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, so proceed with caution)
Before we get to the two reasons that I am actually writing this article, I want to share my thoughts on the play itself, which I really enjoyed. I am the biggest of Harry Potter fans. In real life, I am linked first to movies & politics, and of course the Oscars, but probably name-checked as much is Harry Potter, which pretty much everyone associated with me knows I love (and if you've been to my house, you'll also understand this because there's Harry Potter stuff in virtually every corner). My dad, who went with me, I could see smirking as he saw his 41-year-old son grin from ear-to-ear as they played the opening music and saw Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, and a host of other familiar characters on the stage (no matter how old you get, your parents always see you as a little boy in their hearts). The show itself reads, frequently, as fan service (occasionally even fan fiction), and therefore it's not quite to the caliber of the original books. It offers little in terms of sacrifice of main characters (we are spared the pain of seeing any of the main characters from the original series die in the end). But it's also fun and has moments of solid magic (I loved the stuff in the alternative timeline, and the set design in this is maybe the best I've ever seen give-or-take Matilda in a stage show), and in Rowling's distinctive fashion (she is, for all of the criticism of her, someone who is good at showing the sacrifices & truths of growing up), she gives us a real parable about a young boy who is coming to terms with his own sexuality. In a shock that is proof that I didn't have this play ruined for me through the years, Harry Potter & Draco Malfoy's sons are pretty explicitly shown to be romantic partners by the end of the play, something that might in part explain why this hasn't been made into a Warner Brothers big-screen movie given the billion-dollar implications.
Of course, the other is that Rowling herself has basically torched her reputation (making stars like Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, & Rupert Grint, were they even open to returning to the roles for likely 8-figure paydays, far more apprehensive). It's not new news to talk about this, and indeed if you look back through the years on this blog you'll find I've weighed in a few times on the author who I grew up hero-worshiping in my twenties only to be disgusted by her in my thirties. Cancel culture, in my opinion, has somehow not gone far enough and has perhaps in other ways gone too far. Case in point for the latter-at a Netflix roast for Kevin Hart this weekend, Chelsea Handler made a crack about the Riyadh Comedy Festival, in the oppressive regime of Saudi Arabia where there is a long history of censorship and human rights violations...a comedy at which roast dais members Pete Davidson, Jeff Ross, & Kevin Hart all performed. But in turn they're all still working (i.e. they're getting checks for appearing at this roast), with Hart starring in a $100M franchise entry in the Jumanji series later this year, likely making a fortune in the process.
This is, in part, because it's next-to-impossible to keep track of all of the things that people are expected to boycott or protest online. Go on the social media of virtually any celebrity online and you will find a series of gloating and angry complaining underneath their posts. Never mind that these platforms we're all using are owned by men with actual power who are actually destroying the planet (like Elon Musk & Mark Zuckerberg), so even using these platforms is tantamount to endorsing cruelty. It's exhausting, and makes boycotts of entertainers impossible all-things-considered. This is why Scream VII, despite many calls to boycott, ended up being a huge box office success, and why it appears likely that the Harry Potter TV series will be a blockbuster its first season (and perhaps its whole run)-people cannot be at 11 all the time, and if that's the expectation from online culture...you're going to find people tapping out and choosing not to protest anything. This isn't necessarily me trying to have my cake-and-eat-it-too (I'm not endorsing complacency), but I will admit that the expectations of being a social progressive online feel, to a degree I have not experienced before, unrealistic. I do not have the money, time, or knowledge to be able to successfully boycott every person & company whose opinions I disagree. This doesn't mean that I won't continue to stay away from certain entertainers or places (I have never been to a Chic-Fil-A, and in a year I have devoted to action stars each week, you'll note that Mel Gibson is not one of the stars I'm going to focus on despite him being a staple of the genre and admittedly an actor whose career would be fascinating to profile), but it does mean that I am struggling to keep up with what increasingly inconsistent voices on the internet want from me.
This is in particular a situation that has come up repeatedly, and relates to Harry Potter in a different way-whether it is appropriate for an adult to be entertained by it at all. Go on your social media, and you'll find that people are perpetually talking about the concept of Disney Adults, very much a cousin of the Harry Potter Adult. These are people who regularly go to Disney parks, spend a significant amount on merchandise & travel expenses, and in some cases more than they have. The latest round of this was brought on by a New Yorker article about people going into dramatic debt over the Disney trips.
I will say-you should not go into serious debt trying to live a Disney adult lifestyle, period, end of story. I talked recently about 401k withdrawal penalties (and my support of them), and will own that I think people should be more respectful of their personal finances. But I also think that, if you can afford it, you should do trips to places like Disney & Universal, even as an adult with no children, for a number of reasons.
For starters, these parks are fun, and not really wholly meant for children (even Walt Disney said that). The detail, character work, and even some of the rides are created in a way to inspire magic for all ages, and honestly are way more in-depth than a child is really going to appreciate. To pretend otherwise is to ignore that things like musical theater, Las Vegas & Atlantic City, cruise lines, and all sporting events that are things that are very much about play and make-believe, yet for some reason they are not considered to be "age inappropriate" for adults and (save for the gambling) are things generally enjoyed by children. Additionally, given the disproportionately large amount of money that these major theme parks make as a result of childless adults visiting their parks, they basically couldn't stay in business were it not for these clients (there's a reason that they are creating things like food festivals at Epcot...to keep them coming back). And these Disney adults are not the reason that these parks are going up in exorbitant costs-that's on larger nationwide financial policy, and also that it should cost more to take a family of four to a park than it does a single person or a couple (also, let's be honest here-the cost per person for a family of four going to a Disney park is WAY less than it is for a single or coupled group). It's not single people's fault you can't afford this-that's on you (and, admittedly, Republican lawmakers who have made life considerably more expensive in the Trump era).
That said, and to close, I will say that Disney adults, I don't totally have your back even if I'm basically at this point counted among you (I have planned two trips to Disney/Universal locals over the past year, and will have two more if my finances hold in the next two years, albeit in four different cities for each of them). You should have trips that see things other than Disney. You should read/watch movies other than Disney and Harry Potter. Occasionally, you need to challenge yourself by going to more traditionally adult spots like art museums, plays, R-rated movies, and even pick up a book written by someone like Dickens or Austen or Dostoevsky. The play and "adulthood is hard, let's be a kid again" vibe of Disney and Harry Potter only work if you do, in fact, try to expand your mind in adulthood into things that are intended exclusively for you, not just in part.
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