(l) David Fine and (r) Adam Grant Morrison. Photo by Eric Zimmerman

On a dreary spring morning in St. Louis, actors Adam Grant Morrison and David Fine are talking about their pivotal roles in Harry Potter and the Cursed Child’s national tour, now in its second year. Morrison mentions a scene in which his and Fine’s characters — Albus Severus Potter and Scorpius Malfoy, respectively — have a very prickly moment. “They get in each other’s faces,” he shares.

That there are tensions between the two likely won’t come as a surprise. Those familiar with the surnames might even imagine a wand-wielding Hatfield and McCoy faceoff. After all, one is the middle child of author J.K. Rowling’s famous, if no-longer-a-boy wizard, Harry Potter; the other is the son of the infamous Draco Malfoy, the one-time bully at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Now their sons attend the same storied school. Yet, Albus and Scorpius’ clash isn’t that of nemeses. Instead, it is steeped with the kind of hurt feelings and frustrations that so often accompany a deep friendship. That these two lads — so uncomfortable with the weight of their family names — build a bond amid the cliques and Houses at the hallowed school rankles their fathers, especially the dad of the title.

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child North American tour. Photo by Evan Zimmerman

The Inspiration

The winner of six Tonys, including Best Play, Cursed Child arrives to Denver having been heralded for its jaw-dropping illusions and rich design but also for its heart-centered drama. For all the death and darkness — of which there are plenty, thanks to the malevolent Lord Voldemort — persistent amity has been the saga’s boon and beacon.

“Come for the magic. Stay for the friendship” might well have been the motto for the Harry Potter series from the start. For nearly two decades, readers and moviegoers witnessed the titular orphan and his best friends, Ron Weasley and Hermoine Granger, navigate the challenges, youthful blunders and copious wonders of Hogwarts. (In December, HBO will reboot the story, returning to the book that began it all, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone.)

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child North American tour. Photo by Matthew Murphy

The Playwright

The play’s author, Jack Thorne, resonated with the ways the young Harry P was a hero but also, fundamentally, an odd kid out. “I really wanted to get into what’s it like at Hogwarts when you don’t fit in,” he wrote in Harry Potter and the Cursed Child: The Journey, about embarking on a play that carries the spirit of the series. (Rowling, along with Thorne and director John Tiffany, shaped this work).

“One of the first conversations Jo and I had was about the fact that we both found school excruciating. I said I thought that ten or eleven was the age I realized it was possible I might not have any friends.” — Jack Thorne, Playwright

So, Thorne devised a rich connection, one that addresses fathers and sons, generational trauma and grief, but also embraces the enduring fondness of friends and the awkward aches of youth. When the boys meet — in much the way Harry met his own dearest friends — on the Hogwarts Express, something is set in motion whether Harry likes it or not. Over time, he likes it less and less and finally forbids Albus from spending time with Scorpius. It is, alas, the sort of demand sure to produce conflict.

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child North American Tour. Photo by Evan Zimmerman

The Friendship of Albus and Scorpius

“I think the relationship between Albus and Scorpius is one of the most important parts of the entire show,” Morrison says. “It’s a catalyst. When the two meet, they immediately understand that there’s a connection, that there’s already a bond that’s been formed, whether or not there should have been because of the whole family differences.”

A life preserver of the first order, friendship has had its impressive champions: from Charlotte Brontë to Maya Angelou, Aristotle to Whodini. (“Friends. How many of us have them,” indeed.) Rowling contributed her own oft quoted insight on the matter when she wrote in Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, “It takes a great deal of bravery to stand up to our enemies, but just as much to stand up to our friends.” It’s an insight that gets us back to Albus and Scorpius and their portrayers, Morrison and Fine.

“Albus is young. He’s a teenager — which is a very hard thing to be. And a lot of the ways that he grows happen because of Scorpius. I feel like understanding Scorpius helps him understand the world better.” — Adam Grant Morrison (Albus Severus Potter)

Scorpius is a surprisingly kind soul. “Their relationship is so relatable and human because you get to see them figuring out how to be better friends to one another,” says Fine. “Scorpius and Albus are wizards, but they’re also teenagers, like Adam is saying. You do get to see them struggle and learn how to better support one another.”

Julia Nightingale, David Fine, Adam Grant Morrison. Photo by Evan Zimmerman

The Actors

Fine has been with the tour since its launch, Morrison joined on its second iteration. We know how their characters landed at Hogwarts: they’re legacies. But Morrison’s and Fine’s paths to the celebrated show were less obvious. It wasn’t until high school that Morrison started being interested in theater, when at the nudging of his twin sister — “my best friend in the world,” he says without missing a beat — he auditioned for a musical. After a youth spent playing sports in Atlanta, he became a theater geek. He majored in musical theater at Oklahoma City University.

For his part, Fine, who grew up in the arts haven of Asheville, North Carolina, saw from an early age what a life in the arts might look like. “My aunt is an actress based in Chicago, and I grew up watching her perform,” he says. “I think, just seeing her and knowing that that was a viable career that one could pursue gave me a leg up. Because I never questioned whether this was something one could actually do.” Yet, when it came time to head to college, he went to the University of North Carolina and studied economics.

“I ended up moving to New York after school, just falling in with a really great group of people who encouraged me to go out and chase that dream that I had had since a kid watching my aunt. That’s sort of how I ended up here.” — David Fine (Scorpius Malfoy)

Now Fine and Morrison are taking lessons from their characters on friendship and offering them night after night to the young and the grown; the kids that crowd the stage door after the show, wearing their Hogwarts duds and the parents who learn a thing or two about the mysteries of nurturing, the magic of listening.

“I think the relationship between Albus and Scorpius is one of the most important parts of the entire show, the entire story. It’s a catalyst,” says Morrison.

Ah theater. It has so often been — and continues to be — the hallowed space where the gifted, the curious, the self-identifying misfits seek and find their people. Once they do, they go about the business of making all manner of magic. Sound familiar?

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