Comcast Hints That ‘Harry Potter’ Will Go To Additional Universal Parks

It’s been rumored for some time and even today Time Warner boss Jeff Bewkes said the news was coming soon. Now Comcast’s Universal Parks & Resorts has confirmed that it will build a Harry Potter attraction inside its Universal Studios Hollywood theme park, as well as expand its uber-profitable The Wizarding World of Harry Potter attraction at its Orlando resort. It’s there that the year-plus-old Potter-themed attraction has helped boost revenue by 33% through the first nine months of 2011, and attendance is up 50% since Wizarding’s June 2010 launch, making the move to other parks a no-brainer. (Yesterday, Comcast CFO Mike Angelakis called the attraction at Universal Orlando’s Islands of Adventure “a reset mechanism” for the park.) “It was a game changer for us and frankly for Orlando,” Universal Studios president Ron Meyer told the Associated Press after today’s announcement. “The expansion in Orlando will make it that much more of a must-see, and we’ll have the same experience here.” The new installation is expected to create more than 1,000 jobs. Los Angeles County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky told the AP that he was told Universal’s concert venue Gibson Amphitheatre would be axed to make way for the Potter attraction. No plan details or time frames were discussed. Harry Potter is a Warner Bros property.