If you didn’t get a chance to catch the dazzling stage show “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child” when it was last in San Francisco — before getting COVID-canceled in March 2020 — well, it’s back.
But the “Cursed Child” now playing in previews at The Curran is significantly different than the version that was playing two years ago at the stately Geary Street theater. The main thing is it is no longer a two-part 5-plus-hour affair, which fans could enjoy in marathon style on a single day or split up over two days. It’s now a newly-staged single-performance show running about 3½ hours.
But, as the New York Times wrote of the new version of “Cursed Child” when it opened on Broadway late last year, “it remains diamond-sharp in its staging and dazzling in its visual imagination, as magical as any spell or potion.”
And the story line — created by Potter author J.K. Rowling, Jack Thorne and John Tiffany — is pretty much the same. The action returns to Hogwarts 19 years after the books and movies left off, and Harry Potter’s son is a student at the legendary wizarding school.
Details: In previews through Feb. 10; main run is Feb. 10-Sept. 4; check websites for COVID updates; $79-$299 (subject to change); sfcurran.com or sf.harrypottertheplay.com.