The following is an abridged version of the interview, with selections that apply to our discussion. Reading the full interview would have taken something like an hour, and no one has time for that. The Interviewer is Mark Phillips, who first profiled author J.K. Rowling in 1999 before she truly hit it big.

PHILLIPS: What did theatre hold for you as a prospect?

ROWLING: If I'm honest, it was the prospect of working with these guys. Because Sonia and Colin, our producers, were offering me the chance to work with two people that I thought were extraordinary. And I felt confident from our first meeting that we could make something really special happen. Now, I could have been wrong. We still have had a huge amount of fun doing it, because we ended up very good friends, and that's an incredible thing to take two very good friends for, out of a creative process like this. But it so happens that three of us worked very, very well together, and I think we produced something we're all very proud of.

TIFFANY: We're now talking about bringing it to Broadway, which we're so excited about, aren't we?

ROWLING: We really are.

TIFFANY: As we progressed with the ideas for the story, and the three of us kind of met and started talking about, you know, what story "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child" was going to tell, it became clear to me that we were gonna be doing something quite unique, in that we were taking a group of characters that an audience had seen through seven books and eight films, and we were going to tell a new story featuring those characters. And so it's been such an honor, hasn't it, sitting in the audience from the very, very first performances, seeing the people come in, knowing these characters and yet not knowing what was going to happen to them. And the gasps! It's exactly why I went into theatre and became a theatre director -- you want people to gasp and coo and be unified as an audience together watching the story. And that's been a joy.

ROWLING: No, it's amazing.

PHILLIPS: Did you actually have a fear, though, that they might not like it?

ROWLING: Of course. Good lord. Of course. I don't think any sort of creative person alive would not understand how we all felt going into that first preview. I think we three, do you agree? We felt we'd made it as good as we could make it. We were proud of it. We thought we'd done a good job. But, you know, that's three of us.

PHILLIPS: But the weight of expectation, I would have thought--

ROWLING: Yeah, exactly. It's the weight of expectation. You know that people are coming in with a huge number of preconceived ideas. You know that candidly, some people are taking the view, "Maybe they've just dialed this in. Maybe they're just trying to get a little extra out the franchise." And we knew it was something very new and different. But the proof is when the audience sees it.

PHILLIPS: Has there ever been a point where you felt your audience, your public rebel against what you were doing?

ROWLING: Oh god, yeah.

PHILLIPS: There has been?

ROWLING: Come on. This is the age of social media. You think I don't get told in no uncertain terms that I've done the thing they didn't want to happen to a character, or why on Earth am I taking it into theatre? No, believe you, in the age of social media, one is never deluded about the fact that some people aren't happy, expect not to be happy. That's the way it goes.

PHILLIPS: Do you care what the public says?

ROWLING: Do I care? Do you know, I'm going to be very honest. Yes, I do. And no, I don't. For me, I always go back to readers. So the fact that people love the books, and the movies as well, and that those stories meant so much to so many people, that is everything to me. On the "no, I don't" side, I think as a writer or any kind of creative person, you actually do have to hold tight to your vision. And ultimately you have to be able to look in the mirror and say, "Did I do that for the right reasons? Did I do it to the best of my ability? Am I happy with the result?"

PHILLIPS: Because you were afraid you could be pandering?

ROWLING: Well, I know I'm never gonna pander. I know, genuinely, I know full well, I have limited time left on this Earth. I have no interest whatsoever in doing certain things that I know would be very popular with the fandom.

PHILLIPS: Is it possible to give Potter fans too much? Or will they suck up anything that you lay on to them? Why stop at two performances? Coulda gone on for a week.

ROWLING: Just because -- she spoke like a mother -- just because people want a lot doesn't mean they should have everything that they want. We'll just give them what's good for them. And we decided that this was. And it is, you're absolutely right.

PHILLIPS: Long as they finish what's on their plates.

ROWLING: There you go.

PHILLIPS: Which of the three of you was most responsible for the storyline as it weaves its way into the future?

ROWLING: The developing the story, I think, was very collaborative between the three of us. I, for obvious reasons, had power of veto over everything. I could say, "No, that didn't happen." But no, it was the three of us. But the play is Jack's play. Jack did the writing. Jack did the heavy lifting. And he did it beautifully. And I couldn't be happier.

PHILLIPS: But you retained power, just as you did in the movies, power of veto just because you feel you still own the Potter character.

ROWLING: It wasn't really a question of ownership. I know this is gonna sound very bizarre. I know it's right when I have a sensation of, "Oh yeah, of course, that happened." And that when the three of us were kicking that around, one of these guys would say, "Well, how about--" and I'd have that feeling, "Oh yeah, of course, that's what happened." I just knew. And sometimes it would be me saying, "I think this happened." And unsurprisingly with my own ideas, I definitely thought they were probably what happened. But often, we would be sitting there and trying to finesse something, and one of these guys would say, and I would know, "Yeah, that's how it happened." It felt like excavation, which is how I know that I'm on the right track, when I feel that I am actually uncovering a story that's already there.

PHILLIPS: Which is what you've always said about this story.

ROWLING: Exactly. And I had exactly the same experience. It was one of the most joyful experiences of my life, working with these two. I absolutely loved it from beginning to end.

PHILLIPS: And does the journey go on beyond that? Is this the end of it?

ROWLING: There won't be an -- I mean, (LAUGHS) no. This is it. Harry will not be in any other play. This is it. "Cursed Child" is it. I couldn't feel happier about it. We couldn't duplicate this. Nothing could ever match up. If no one else loves it after this, we loved it, didn't we? We loved it. (LAUGHS)

PHILLIPS: You had a great time?

ROWLING: We had an amazing time, yeah.

ROWLING: Well, with the Robert Galbraith books, I...I always wanted to write detective novels. And I wanted to go back to the beginning, and I wanted to send it out as an unsolicited manuscript, and I wanted to get honest feedback, and I wanted to go through that whole process again, and so I did.

PHILLIPS: Why?

ROWLING: You know, because I'm not stupid. (LAUGHS) I'm fully aware that I could write a really rubbish detective story and people would probably say, "Well, you know, it'll probably sell a few copies 'cause it's got her name on it,"

PHILLIPS: It wasn't as if you had any doubts as to whether you could write? I think the jury's come in on that one?

ROWLING: Yeah, but it's a different genre though, isn't it? You're an arrogant person if you assume that because you can do one thing, you can do everything. And I'm not that person.