I was on YouTube the other day, listening to a comparison between Stephen Fry and Jim Dale, reading the final chapter of The Deathly Hallows, the final confrontation between Voldemort and Harry. Peter: This is something I can’t argue with… and actually, this undermines my own argument a bit. His voice does this magical sparkly shivery thing. But again, we’re back to the Christopher Nolan / Tim Burton thing.īasically, I just want to give Jim Dale a big hug every time something really spooky or mysterious happens (Patronus!), and I think that’s why I’ve got to stand by him. Whereas Fry handles the same scene with beautiful tenderness and humanity. His Hermione is a little too bossy and his Harry is a little too stupid.
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I will concede that Dale sometimes misses the mark with major characters in key scenes: like when Hermione and Harry are trying to figure out how to work the time-turner in Azkaban, Dale’s exaggeration is kind of painful. The scenes at Hogwarts with the ghosts, professors, and portrait people always slay me in Dale’s version, while I think Fry’s subtlety can work against him. (What’s stronger than 100% - can I 127% disagree?) I credit Jim Dale’s secondary characters for finally converting me to the world of Harry Potter. Rachel: That is so fascinating, because I completely 100% disagree. The really minor ones, like Stan and Ernie on the Knight Bus, are, to my mind, both hilarious and very much their own people, when Stephen does it. I think Stephen Fry inhabits the secondary characters the best, too. Peter: I dunno if she would’ve watched Blackadder while writing the book, but it was such a gigantic part of the television landscape - like Fawlty Towers, like Monty Python - that I seriously doubt she was unaware of it. Also, bonus points for “sensawunda,” natch! Do you think Rowling would have been watching Blackadder during the same period she was writing? I haven’t actually seen the episodes, so you win that point by default. Rachel: Oooh, good catch with Blackadder. Harry Potter’s dialog owes a lot to something like Blackadder, which puts it firmly into Stephen Fry’s court. I think it would’ve collapsed.Īside: I think Stephen Fry and his particular world of film was somewhere in the mix when J.K. But imagine if Chris Columbus had had to go on and direct, say, The Half-Blood Prince, where things are very dark and very complex and no longer tiny wizards solving magical mysteries. Just like Chris Columbus was an amazing director for the first two films, because he brought this bright, magical world to life. There’s a powerful sensawunda in Jim Dale’s reading, which is particularly perfect for the first two books. I think Jim Dale does a great cartoonish, larger-than-life, magical world. Peter: I think you’re completely right, which is what great debates are built out of, innit, two people definitely agreeing on things. Fry has the human moments down, but Dale wins the magical and comical moments, which are what I love most about Harry Potter. Fry totally nails the scenes between Harry and Sirius in Azkaban.īut ultimately, I think Dale takes more risks with higher payoff. He could be a grandpa reading you to sleep (or a Peter!), and I think he packs more empathy. But Fry is more nuanced, realistic, and familiar.
His Hermione is more shrill, Draco more cartoonishly evil, Trelawney more spooky and ditzy, McGonagle more stern, Hagrid more bumbling, etc. Right? Dale is more of a character actor / “voice artist,” with more over-the-top exaggeration. Rachel: I am with you on that, and the comparison that kept running through my head was Christopher Nolan’s Batman versus Tim Burton’s Batman. This is also invaluable as the books themselves get longer and deeper and darker. Partially, it’s because he has a deeper voice and a sense of how to slow down and lend an ominous quality to certain passages.
For one thing, I think he has a gravitas about his reading. Peter: I’m willing to call Stephen Fry’s readings superior for various reasons. Rachel: I think I gotta stay with my boy Jim Dale, and I’m loving how in-it-to-win-it you are for Stephen Fry. Which horse are you putting your money on? (Or are you going for both? And how much longer can I sustain horse-racing metaphors, about which I know zilch?) I am prepared to go to the mat over this one.
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