Spell is broken at last as Harry Potter cast reach end of an incredible journey

The freshly refurbished St. Pancras Renaissance Hotel is packed with more than 250 international journalists. Spanish TV crews rub shoulders with reporters from Portugal, New Zealand, Germany and the UK.

On a desk manned by brisk Warner Bros personnel are signs for the melee to come: TV crews check in, UK Press check in, International Press check in, European Press check in.

Film crews and their cameras are everywhere. It’s an invasion. And that’s even before one enters the rarefied atmosphere of the Hansom Hall. In the annals of film junkets, this is BIG. Maybe even the biggest ever. Bigger than The Lord of the Rings. Bigger than The Matrix. Bigger than Star Wars.

Strolling tourists offer their comments. “It’s getting five-star reviews,” says one elderly woman. “It’s the last one,” offers her companion. Across the years, from one generation to another, Harry Potter has made a gigantic impact. It is, claim the makers, the last one. Ever. The event begins almost 45 minutes late. TV host Alex Zane crops up to present a hurried pre-recorded interview with Daniel Radcliffe, filmed in New York. It’s an apology for Radcliffe’s absence; he’s starring on Broadway in How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.

In his place sit 22 other members of the series’ cast and crew. It’s the largest single press conference in modern British film history. The dais stretches the length of the room. On the extreme left, Nick (Scabior) Moran. On the far right, Domhnall (Bill Weasley) Gleeson. And in between sits everyone else.

That’s Warwick Davis, Natalia Tena, David Thewlis, producer David Barron, Evanna Lynch, Jason Isaacs, Helen McCrory, Tom Felton, producer David Heyman, Ralph Fiennes, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint, director David Yates, Julie Walters, Robbie Coltrane, Sir Michael Gambon, Matthew Lewis, Bonnie Wright, James Phelps and Oliver Phelps.

David Yates, director of the last four pictures and the man who brought the show to a close, speaks for many. “It’s been a wonderful experience,” says the 47-year-old Salford native. “We’ve all been to the moon together, as it were. That’s very special.”

Daniel Radcliffe, in his taped chat, admits to a feeling of overwhelming nostalgia. “It’s a bit sad because I’m not that innocent lovely little thing anymore. It’s strange and nostalgic and weird.” Rupert Grint goes even further. “After we finished, a year or so ago, I felt a little bit lost. I didn’t know what to do with myself. It’s been such a constant part of my life [so] it’s quite sad. I really am genuinely going to miss it.”

Emma Watson adds: “After this last one ended I started getting this itch – ‘I’m ready to go back now’. It’s so difficult to process.”

The Harry Potter series took over Leavesden Studios, a former Rolls-Royce factory 18 miles outside London, 10 years ago. As Yates observes, “It’s going to create a huge hole. It’s been a mini- industry employing thousands of people. It’s in all our interests to find the next one, but lightning doesn’t strike twice. It will be very hard to follow the kinetic power of Harry Potter but there is no shortage of people looking.”

For Grint “it’s all kind of a blur”. For Coltrane, who played the giant Hagrid, “a thoroughly good man” in all eight films, “something wonderful has gone.”

Everyone seems to agree that the Potter films are unique. Certainly they have got progressively darker, more mature, deadly and evil.

“When we were making the first film [Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone in 2000] I hoped to make a film like The Railway Children or Chitty Chitty Bang Bang,” says producer David Heyman. “It’s been an amazing journey and one that’s been full of surprises.”

Yates adds: “Jo [author JK Rowling] is very generous in creating this world. It offers us something bigger and more extraordinary than our own lives. There are some universal themes: the power of love and faith, feeling of loss. And death is a big feature in the movie. Death is a theme that runs through Jo’s books. And the sense of loss and dealing with loss.”

There are lighter moments from the group. Emma Watson is asked what her character means to her. “Hermione? She feels so real to me. I will actually just miss being her – this girl that lives in this magical, amazing world.”

Asked to compare the kissing techniques of co-stars Radcliffe and Grint, she gulps. “I should have expected that one! Kissing Harry for that scene was a figment of Ron’s imagination. It had to be passionate. Kissing Rupert... we had just been soaked. Both were complete gentlemen. [But] once you had done it four or five times kissing gets very boring!” Alex Zane asks the cast to name their favourite prop. Most choose their wand.

“You were only given it at the beginning of the scene,” recalls Warwick Davis. “Then they were taken swiftly off you straight away so they wouldn’t end up on eBay!” Halfway through the wand question Yorkshire actor Matthew Lewis excuses himself and dashes off a loo break, closely followed by Rupert Grint. Everyone laughs. It’s a party atmosphere.

Earlier in the day, I’d spoken to 22-year-old Lewis, the Leeds actor who, as awkward Neville Longbottom, really comes into his own in the final film. This is the lad who had to smooth off his West Yorkshire tones because, when referring to his pet toad in the early films, American director Chris Columbus heard it as “turd”.

“I couldn’t say it to save my life,” he laughs, “so I worked on that with a voice coach. Neville does have a northern accent, he is from Yorkshire, but you have to be aware of the international audience. I was keen to keep it because I’m proud of where I’m from. The acting world shouldn’t be an elitist environment just for people with a received pronunciation accent.”

Like his fellow ensemble players, Lewis recalls his final moments on set with a wince. He had been part of the setpiece climactic scenes that conclude Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2. But his last moments before the camera were later, with the second unit, as he filmed a frantic chase across a bridge. “The unit was working until four in the morning,” he remembers. “When I finished they were cold, wet and very disinterested in me finishing.

“There was a quick round of applause and they all moved on to the next scene. I just walked off on my own. It was all a bit of an anti-climax after a decade of filming.”

I get the last question. It’s for Ralph Fiennes, the actor who brings Shakespearian majesty to Voldemort, the story’s über villain.

“It’s been a wonderful part to play – a high-definition villain. I’ve loved it,” he says. “It demands a degree of theatricality, if you like. And then the balance of nuance and sense of an inner life. I hope I found the balance. People say he’s frightening and I think he should be.”

And so it ends. Or does it? There are whispers that Rowling is considering penning a prequel.

David Yates sets the cat among the pigeons. “Jo keeps a discreet distance. She signs off the screenplay and if she has any issues she communicates them. She’s at the end of the telephone if we need her. It’s the perfect relationship.

“She’s not particularly hands-on. [But] she’s there to guide us if we need her.

“Will there be a prequel? Jo has such an extraordinary imagination. I don’t know how you put a stopper on that. I’m sure if she wrote more the world would be happy to read it. “

Producer David Heyman kills it dead with 10 terse words: “Jo has no plans to write another Harry Potter book.”

So that’s that. Clearly, it’s been emotional.

FILMS WERE BOX OFFICE MAGIC

the film adaptations of JK Rowling’s books have always been lavish affairs. The last film cost an estimated £150m, but the eyewatering budgets more than make their money back at the box office.

To date, the films have taken more than $6m – the highest grossing film series of all time – and with the final instalment out this week that figure is likely to soar.

However, for all the financial success, the films have failed to score at the Oscars, with cast and crew routinely overlooked at the Academy Awards, although they have received an armful of Bafta nominations.

* Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 3D (12A) is released on July 15.