Potter For Pittance

Harry Potter is almost here. Tickets are sold out for weeks, merchandise is practically walking off the shelves and almost everywhere you look there's a bespectacled wizard grinning back at you. All this would lead you to believe that someone somewhere is positively raking in the pennies but, according to actress Zoe Wanamaker, it certainly won't be the cast. Playing Quidditch coach Madam Hooch in the film, Wanamaker has said she will boycott future Potter projects if salaries are not greatly increased. Telling the Sunday Times that she received less for the multimillion pound blockbuster than for a recent BBC production, the actress bemoaned the absence of any residual payments for herself and other British actors in the film, despite the use of their likenesses in spin-off computer titles. "We have all been cyber-scanned so we can all be replicated [in computer games]. It's bad form. Even the costume designer who came up with these amazing creations will get no residuals. It's shocking and disgraceful." Wanamaker, who would be scheduled to return to coach the quidditch team in later instalments seems so put out by her lack of remuneration for the film - which has already amassed record takings more than a week before release - that her return for The Chamber of Secrets and beyond has been thrown into doubt. "Some actors signed three-film deals but the money was so crap I was insulted so just signed for one. If they want me for a second they will have to up their rates."