Ten years, eight films and over six billion dollars – Warner Brothers’ Harry Potter film franchise is coming to a close this weekend and by all accounts it is going out with a bang.  Leading up to its Friday debut, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows 2 had already smashed the record for US pre-sales with $50 million worth of advanced tickets sold.  Today Warner Brothers reports that the film took in $43.5 million from midnight screenings alone: easily topping the previous record of $30 million set by Twilight Saga: Eclipse last summer.  A second Twilight Saga record now set to fall is the one-day US record of $72 million set by New Moon.  With many of Potter’s 4,375 theatres screening this final installment back-to-back throughout Friday, a first day of $80 million is anticipated. Here in the US the film could go as high $180 million for its first weekend – though anything over $158 million would smash the all-time 3-day weekend benchmark set by The Dark Knight in 2008.  Internationally Deathly Hallows 2 has taken in $58 million from 24 territories for a global cume of over $105 million.  We’ll update you throughout the weekend as the most successful franchise in history wraps up its remarkable run.

In the US, the Fourth of July weekend is traditionally a giant money-maker for Hollywood movies. So, surprise!  This year was a giant money maker for Hollywood movies.  Make that “movie.”  Three movies debuted, but only one – Michael Bay’s Transformers: Dark of the Moon – made an impact.  A big, record-breaking impact.

Trained at the Tisch School of the Arts program at New York University, and with a background working on the New York stage, Bryce Dallas Howard has already amassed an impressive list of film credits. As part of such franchises as Spider-Man, Terminator and now The Twilight Saga, the actress is balancing big-budget blockbusters with smaller independent roles, including her latest in The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond, from an original Tennessee Williams screenplay.

During the press day for that film, Bryce Dallas Howard gave some hints about her role in The Twilight Saga: Eclipse, her involvement in the Clint Eastwood supernatural thriller Hereafter, and whether she’ll return for Spider-Man 4.

Read what she had to say after the jump: