CONFIRMED: DH Will Be Split In Two; Yates to Direct

With Matt Lewis's slip of turn earlier today, it seems quite timely that in an exclusive report from the LA Times today that is has now, and finally been officially confirmed that Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows WILL BE SPLIT INTO TWO (COUNT THEM TWO) FILMS: "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1" and "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part II." Part One is due November 2010, with Part Two due for May 2011.

The exclusive also cites Harry Potter producer David Heyman confirming that David Yates will return two helm the final two films, along with Steve Kloves to write both screenplays. It goes on to quote Heyman discussing Jo's reaction to the decision:

Heyman said he approached Rowling with some trepidation about the strategy but found that she signed off on its logic rather quickly. "I went to Jo and she was cool with it," Heyman said, "and that was quite a relief."

...

Producer David Heyman said the decision was made with some anxiety and only after considerable deliberations. The producer joked that "while my wife and Warner Brothers were pleased" to hear that the Potter movie magic will continue into the next decade, he himself fretted that the cynical observers would see the decision as a purely mercenary move."I swear to you it was born out of purely creative reasons," Heyman said during an interview in a converted airplane factory outside London that has been home base to all of the "Potter" productions. "Unlike every other book, you cannot remove elements of this book. You can remove scenes of Ron playing quidditch from the fifth book, and you can remove Hermione and S.P.E.W. [Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare] and those subplots . . . but with the seventh, that can't be done."

The report even quotes Daniel Radcliffe as saying:

I think it's the only way you can do it without cutting out a huge portion of the book," Radcliffe said recently during a break on the set of "Half-Blood Prince. There have been compartmentalized subplots in the other books that have made them easier to cut - although those cuts were still to the horror of some fans- but the seventh book doesn't really have any subplots. It's one driving, pounding story from the word go.

UPDATE The LA Times now has published a second story, with comments from WB Chairman Alan Horn on the decision to split the seventh book into two films:

"This way, we have an extra hour and a half, at least, to celebrate what this franchise has been and do justice to all the words and ideas that Jo has put in the amazing story. This is the end of the story too. We want to celebrate it. We want to give a full meal."

Horn also addressed the issue of the Trio acting in the epilogue:

"Horn said that particular denouement has the filmmakers fretting about how to keep the young familiar stars on the screen just before it goes dark. "That," Horn said, "is something we will need to deal with. People have watched these kids grow up, and it's been very special to do so. That's important to us."