"Margot Robbie?"
"Wow~"
"How the hell did Susie dig her up?"
June 24, 2002.
Isabella received casting results from Susie, straight out of Australia.
A quick skim—and boom. In the middle of the resumes Susie was stubbornly pushing, Isabella spotted the future Harley Quinn herself. When Harley Quinn's file landed in front of her, Isabella really did freeze for a second. Because in the future, this girl would be huge.
Susie just "randomly picks" and ends up pulling a global star out of a hat? Yeah… not surprising. That's why everyone in the British acting circle calls her the Queen of Casting. The skill level's terrifying.
With Harley Quinn joining the lineup, the skeleton of The Voice's cast was basically complete. Isabella decided to slot Harley Quinn in as the final villain—wasting good talent would be criminal.
And, to be honest, Isabella had liked Margot Robbie's performances in The Wolf of Wall Street, Suicide Squad, Birds of Prey, and The Suicide Squad… Fine, it wasn't really about the quality of the films. It was just that Robbie looked great in them. If you're judging by movie quality alone? Only Wolf of Wall Street makes the cut.
As for Chris Columbus' thoughts? He'd never even met Robbie, but he also agreed to cast her. He trusted Susie's eye implicitly. His earlier objections were political, not practical.
So, Susie recommends her? Then he's in. Simple.
Once the main cast list landed, Isabella narrowed her eyes and nearly laughed out loud. Because The Voice's lineup looked less like a family dramedy and more like the Avengers.
Grandpa: Anthony Hopkins. Hannibal Lecter, Dracula in Bram Stoker's Dracula. Oh, and future Odin, literal king of gods.
Dad: Jude Law. Also a vampire in The Wisdom of Crocodiles, but even better known as both Marvel's space commander Yon-Rogg and young Dumbledore.
Mom: Sadie Frost. Less iconic, but hey, she was also in Bram Stoker's Dracula.
Uncle: Christian Bale. Batman. And in the future? Gorr the God Butcher in Thor: Love and Thunder.
Sister: Keira Knightley. Looks normal until you remember she's cursed by Aztec treasure in Pirates of the Caribbean.
And her, Hermione Granger, the youngest in the family, ready to compete in The Voice.
Honestly, Isabella couldn't see how she could possibly lose.
Her whole family had superpowers. Especially her uncle—his superpower was literally money. How do you compete with that?
The all-star cast had Isabella grinning like an idiot. This stew of overlapping roles and references—only a time traveler could fully appreciate the absurdity. And the villains' side? Pretty strong too.
Phase One boss: a choir boy prodigy from the countryside, same background as the heroine. Played by William Moseley, who'd previously auditioned for Harry Potter. Not a household name in China, but known in the West. His big credit: The Chronicles of Narnia—the commander of the forces of good.
Phase Three boss: Harley Quinn.
Enough said.
With the casting locked, the remaining prep was just details.
How do you build the countryside set? The set designer and executive producer handle it.
Costumes and makeup? The art director and executive producer handle it.
Isabella still had her spy, though—Catherine.
She pushed Catherine into shadowing the exec producer, Barnathan, under the excuse that "my sister loves art and wants to learn." The real point: Isabella wanted to make sure that, although her character was a plain country girl, she wasn't made to look too plain. Average house, simple clothes? Sure. But ugly? Absolutely not. Pretty faces sell tickets.
Catherine fully agreed. She dutifully took notes all day, then at night came back and unloaded them all to Isabella like some human tape recorder.
"Isabel, Barnathan and the art director want your sister to make you a hand-painted T-shirt for the final scene. The kind with messy slogans in paint. Their idea is that when the family hugs at the end, the paint smears everywhere, symbolizing unity."
Every night Catherine came back with this kind of stuff, babbling in detail. Isabella privately thought it was like those webnovel authors who stop writing to go hang out in group chats.
Aside from set design and costumes, Isabella herself had two major jobs in the project. The first was song selection.
There are three competitions in The Voice. Each needs a song. Isabella had already chosen The Climb, which would serve as the main original piece. That left two more.
But they couldn't just be random songs. They needed to carry story weight.
Take The Climb as an example: Columbus wanted it threaded through the entire movie. The film was about chasing dreams, a journey of the soul. So the heroine would "write" The Climb throughout the movie—starting, stopping, failing, picking up again—until it was completed before the final.
It was designed to showcase her genius, but also to give the audience a sense of history unfolding before their eyes. That final performance would hit much harder.
Columbus warned her: "No originals for the first two rounds. Save that punch for the finale. If you use it too often, the audience will get bored—they'll just think, 'she's great, she'll win,' and lose anticipation."
He also thought each earlier round should still have its own meaningful track, tied to the story.
Isabella agreed. For the first round, she picked Eric Clapton's Tears in Heaven.
Why? Because in the story, Grandpa is the one who first supports the heroine. But Grandma has died. That's why Grandpa drinks, that's why he's broken.
So when the heroine sings Tears in Heaven in the first round, it isn't just a competition song. It's a message to Grandpa: "We understand your pain. We miss her too."
Perfect emotional resonance.
And, conveniently, Clapton's music was under Atlantic Records, a Warner subsidiary. Licensing was as easy as calling Barry Meyer. Cheap? No. Warner wouldn't sell full rights, just performance rights and maybe a sliver of royalties. But Isabella didn't care.
First round settled. Second round? No idea yet. But there was time.
Meanwhile, Isabella had her second job: training her voice.
Everyone knew she'd studied piano for years, but piano is an instrument. Singing is different.
So Warner brought in a professor from the Royal Academy of Music to coach her.
The professor listened, then asked in surprise, "Have you studied singing before?"
"…No." Isabella shook her head.
In truth, she'd messed around with a little vocal training in her past life, but nothing formal in this one. So, back to basics.
"Oh, then that's talent."
The old professor nodded. "Your voice is pretty good—clear, clean. But it's a child's voice."
"Your voice change isn't over yet, so the voice you have now may not last into the future."
Isabella knew about the voice change.
Or rather, many child stars are loved because they're cute when they're young, and among that, a nice voice is a huge bonus. But as they grow up, once the voice changes—boom, it all crashes.
That's also why the genre of Teen Pop isn't easy to maintain.
Most teen idols who get famous during puberty are basically forgotten when they grow up.
The change in voice affects them too much.
But for Isabella, this didn't matter.
She wasn't depending on her voice to make a living.
Her foundation wasn't Hermione Granger.
It was her face!
So…
Whether she could walk the road of a singer in the future didn't really matter.
For now, as long as she could make money, that was enough.
This wasn't short-sightedness—voice changes were beyond anyone's control.
While she practiced with the professor in a way that protected her voice, Isabella actually had another task on hand. That one was tied to HP: she had to work with screenwriter Steve Kloves on the script for Prisoner of Azkaban.
Since J.K. Rowling had gone home to rest—
For her, pregnancy and health were the most important things.
Once a person chooses to embrace family, their career naturally relaxes.
So Isabella once again rose to the rank of "Director Isabella," guiding preparations for Azkaban.
Well, not really.
She didn't have that much power. The actual scriptwriting was still handled jointly by Kloves and Columbus, with the final say still in Rowling's hands.
Isabella's role in this triangle was basically to act cute.
Because Kloves was hired by Warner, he represented Warner's interests. Columbus, though reconciled with Rowling, would ultimately fight for his own.
In this setup, when Rowling didn't have time to keep an eye on the script every day, how was her authority expressed?
Normally, a Hollywood writer would send an assistant to communicate. But when you're facing a director like Columbus, sending an assistant was useless.
So—
"Auntie Anne~ good evening!"
"Good evening, Isa. Did you call because something's up?"
"Can't I call you for nothing? That really hurts me when you say that—"
"Hahahaha, of course you can~"
"Alright, alright, you guessed right. I do have something… Today Director Chris and Steve had a huge fight. Steve wants to set the tone of Azkaban as gray and somber, because he thinks Harry's entire experience is tied to his deceased parents, so the film's main color should be dark and heavy. But Chris disagreed—he insists that Harry Potter is, after all, a fairy tale. He doesn't want the film to go too deep into gloom. He says Harry's fans only want to see adventure, to immerse themselves in a dazzling magical world. Generational grudges can exist, Harry can feel sadness and despair, but the audience shouldn't lose themselves in darkness…"
Yep. Since Isabella was going to be working with Columbus for a long time, she naturally became Rowling's special envoy, wielding the imperial sword—authorized to cut down tyrants above and treacherous ministers below.
But since Columbus and Kloves were neither tyrants nor traitors, she couldn't cut down anyone.
(laughs~) Alright, her usual job was mostly passing messages back and forth.
She too wanted Azkaban to turn out the best it could.
When life is fulfilling and full, time really does fly.
And just like that, in the blink of an eye—it was July.
Since the film set lived in its own world, outside of time, Isabella had no idea what was happening online. By the time July 18 arrived, Chamber of Secrets officially wrapped.
At the end, Daniel hugged Isabella goodbye—
"Bye, Isa."
"Bye, Daniel."
"I'm going on vacation, so… see you in winter?"
"See you in winter."
The HP kids had wanted to be in Isabella's film too, but it would've been too distracting, so it didn't work out.
Columbus handed post-production over to David Heyman—
Which meant the Voice project officially began.
Well, officially began in the same place.
Though Leavesden wasn't Warner's own lot, Heyman had leased it long-term since '99. So as long as Isabella's financiers didn't change, she didn't even have to change filming locations.
When that sank in, Isabella frowned.
"Keisha, why do I feel like going to work is the same as going to prison?"
She looked at her sister, half laughing and crying.
Since finishing Chamber of Secrets' location shoot in March, she hadn't left Leavesden.
Eating, sleeping, working—everything was inside the lot!
What kind of immortal life was this?
"You chose this yourself."
Catherine smiled. "Don't tell me you regret it?"
Though being stuck in one place was boring, Catherine could handle solitude.
Isabella too—after all, years of practicing piano was just as dull.
Really, people who can't stand loneliness can't stick to time-consuming crafts.
"I don't regret it."
Isa shook her head at her sister's question. "I just feel like… switching projects without switching locations? That's really weird…"
She wasn't afraid of loneliness. She was afraid of not having money.
So if she could stay in one place and keep making bank? She'd stay until Warner went bankrupt!
Besides, she wasn't really "in prison," was she?
She was free to move around Leavesden;
She was doing what she loved;
She was constantly meeting new people.
For example, now that Voice had officially started, the kids cast in the movie had all arrived at Leavesden. As Isa stood with her hands in her pockets in the reception hall, watching the shuttle bus pull up, one kid after another filed out with their parents—
She was about to go say hi when her eye twitched.
Because suddenly, it felt like she was welcoming new inmates.
And just as she thought this…
"Ahhhhhhh—!!!"
A sudden scream came from the bus.
Looking closely, at the very back, a bob-haired girl was pressed against the window, eyes wide, staring at her.
Her mouth opened so wide it looked like it could swallow a fist.
"HHHHHHHHHermione Granger???"
"Oh!!! My!!! God!!!"
"I must be dreaming???"
And as soon as that shriek rang out—
Swish—
All the kids still in line turned their heads.
The next second—
"Ahhhhhhhhh—!!!"
The little potatoes all started screaming.
Okay, so it wasn't like welcoming new inmates anymore.
Now it was like hosting a fan meet-and-greet.
No—actually, when dozens of half-sized people gathered and screamed together, Leavesden instantly turned into a prairie dog colony.
It was deafening.