Crash to classic: how Practical Magic’s box office hex marked the spot

Almost three decades ago, two young, somewhat raw actresses - Nicole Kidman and Sandra Bullock - walked onto the set of the film Practical Magic and met Stockard Channing and Dianne Wiest. There was natural chemistry, and these four talented, complicated, beautiful women shared a powerful moment, if not, then at least, a cultural one.

Based on the 1995 novel by Alice Hoffman, about a family of witches who are cursed, the film was, seemingly, both a critical and commercial failure. It would have been just another lost chapter in American cinema, except that something curious happened. The film did not go quietly. College campuses, girls’ movie nights, and TV reruns on rainy weekends turned it into a cultural bedrock.

In its post-cinematic life, Practical Magic became one of those movies for which approving murmurs become shouts, and the crown of cult hit is bestowed. It’s an honourable assembly: Soapdish , Hocus Pocus , Outrageous Fortune , Big Business all spring to mind. Unsurprisingly, they share one common thread: feisty women, who will not be silenced. Even when critics and studio accountants have had their say.

A sequel, you say? Why not, thought producer Denise Di Novi, who got the show back on the road. And then, in the middle of last year, Kidman, Bullock, Channing and Wiest walked back on to the set - at the Warner Bros Studios Leavesden in Hertfordshire, England; the original was filmed in California - to rekindle the magic.

“We’re the same, but more,” says Bullock, of the reconnection between the four women. “We’ve got way more experience, and depth, and honesty and …,” adds Kidman, before Bullock interrupts her with: “Less shame.” They also possess, adds Kidman, an “I don’t care, life ain’t fair attitude as well, strangely mixed in, which Dianne and Stockard absolutely have. And probably had originally.”

“They were wicked then,” says Bullock, of the pair’s two older co-stars. “And they’re wicked now both in very unique ways. They’re so different. I think that’s what comes with life and wisdom, and seeing it all, you go, ‘oh, I didn’t have to sweat the small stuff. Why was I worrying about that?’ They know. When you know the secret, everything settles, and you can see it in their eyes.”

“And they’re calm, they’re so calm,” adds Kidman. And now we’ve caught up. They were standing side stage at the London premiere, and they were both just deeply centred. And hopefully, we’re there with some mistakes we’ll make along the way still. We’re the aunts now.” Bullock agrees: “Yes, we’re the aunts now.”

Both Practical Magic and its sequel tell the story of the Owens family: the frank and assertive Frances (Channing), kinder, gentler Bridget (Wiest), and their two nieces, Sally (Bullock), who broadly has tried in her life to reject magic’s role in it, and Gillian (Kidman), a more free-spirited figure, who wields her spell-casting power with more mischief in mind.