Here is what we had been told about this magical moment, from Part 3: The Six Scenes You Missed in Fantastic Beasts:
- The Ilvermorny School Song as Performed by the Goldstein Sisters
“[And there is a cut scene] where Queenie and Tina sing the Ilvermorny song and Newt and Jacob just look at them adoringly and fall in love, in a way.” David Heyman
The actors who play Jacob and Queenie talk about this scene in this interview available on YouTube. The actress who sings the first verse of the song on that clip also wrote it. The first verse is:
We stand as one, united
Against the Puritans!
We draw our inspiration
From Good Witch Morgan…
David Yates also took advantage of Alison Sudol’s musical talents during production on Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them, asking the singer-songwriter, who portrayed Queenie in the film, to “write an alma mater song” that Queenie and Tina (Katherine Waterston) perform to Jacob and Newt Scamander (Eddie Redymayne). David Yates added that during the course of the song you see “the boys slowly fall in love with them.”
David Heyman also noted that this moment came at a rather inopportune time, too, because it took place when Newt, Queenie, Tina and Jacob all go down into the briefcase. “At that point in the story, there’s a lot of stuff going on outside,” he explained, so it felt a little peculiar that all four of them had sat down to sing a song.
Going back to your music, I believe there’s a scene where you sing the Ilvermorny song. Can you still remember?
Alison Sudol: Uh… yeah! It’s a duet, actually, that I do with my sister. But there’s this little part where it was really fun, where it goes: “Why don’t we choo-choo there, Massa-chooo-setts? We choo-choo there! We choo-choo there!”Hear her sing the song hereThat was my favorite part; Katherine and I both liked that.
David Yates mentioned there was a deleted scene where the girls wrote a school song.
Dan: Yeah, so Alison, obviously, is a fantastic musician. They asked her to write the Ilvermorny school song. So there was a moment when they’re down in the suitcase – in the zoo – and we’re like at a little meeting of the minds. In that little respite, they sing the song because they’re trying to argue what’s better – Hogwarts or Ilvermorny.And that’s where the improve of, “I want to be a wizard,” came from. So we’re sitting there. They sing the song. Me and Eddie are sitting there clapping. And Dan Fogler – it was me [saying], “I want to be a wizard!” That’s the one from the trailer. It didn’t make it in the movie.
So what that it was cut? Well…
(3) The Ilvermorny school song is the parallel scene to the first meeting of the Fantastic Foursome in Tina and Queenie’s flat, a second dinner scene. That set-up and it’s turn at film’s center in their successful adventures in and escape from MACUSA headquarters are both wasted. Yes, we are committed to learning more about these two couples without the scene. But why disregard Rowling’s ring artistry?
Unlocking Fantastic Beasts: Finding the Text Round Up
Thank you for bringing this to our attention!
Wow – would ‘comic Orphic’ be a possible description? What’s between microcosm and body politic? – a ‘portmanteaucosm’ (?!) – including Erupent and Demiguise! – brought harmoniously together in peace and delight, as recollection and counterpart of “Our one true home”.
But, “For she was persecuted/By common wandless men/So she fled from distant Ireland/And so our school began” seems a distinctly truncated and, so, distorted picture, assuming what we’re given in ‘Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry’ to be true.