Harry Potter and the Deathy Hallows rehearsals were done in Brummie accents

Jul 3 2011 by Alison Jones, Sunday Mercury

IT was the moment the Weasley twins started speaking in a secret language incomprehensible to the Harry Potter film crew.

Sorcerer siblings Fred and George were deep in family conversation with mum Molly and dad Arthur as the cameras were readied.

Was it a Gryffindor code? A demonic dialect? Long-forgotten lingo found in the labyrinthine library at Hogwarts?

“No,” chorus James and Oliver Phelps, the Sutton Coldfield twins who play flame-haired Fred and George. “It was ... BRUMMIE!

“Julie Walters who plays our mum, was a really big influence on us,” explains James, the younger brother by 13 minutes. “She’s exactly how you think she would be, just lovely. She’s originally from Smethwick, of course.

“It was nice to be part of a Midlands contingent together with Mark Williams (the Bromsgrove comic actor who plays Arthur).

“When we’d rehearse scenes, to keep some energy there we’d all do at least one take in Brummie accents. It was funny to see the Americans there wondering what the hell we were doing.”

As the countdown continues to the July 15 opening of Harry Potter and the Deathy Hallows Part 2 – the epic finalé of the movie series – the Sunday Mercury can reveal life on set wasn’t always deadly serious.

Just like their characters Fred and George, real-life brothers James and Oliver proved to be practical jokers.

“Originally we were really well-behaved but I think the characters rubbed off on us,” says James.

“When you are shooting you’re normally waiting around for hours so you have to keep yourself entertained, and we could always come up with the excuse that we were in character.

“We were on location once and a few of the guys were going off for night shoots. My mates and I decided to get a camera and when they drove past, we took a picture so they thought they’d got flashed by a speed camera,” he recalls.

His brother went one better.

“One of the make-up girls tried to convince us we’d missed the call time, something quite minor,” says Oliver.

“I knew she’d gone away with one of the other girls for a holiday in Cornwall the weekend before. I got her registration plate and had a friend of mine call her, pretending to be from a car parking company, saying she owed them a thousand pounds.

“We had her going for a good five minutes or so before the penny dropped. We subsequently sent the video of it to everyone in the studio who wanted to see it. She didn’t really try any more pranks after that.”

There will be much weeping and wailing and breaking of broomsticks at the end of Harry Potter, as Hogwarts is reduced to rubble in the climactic battle between the scarred schoolboy and snake-faced Lord Voldemort.