Daniel Radcliffe was ‘terrified’ of Alan Rickman while filming ‘Harry Potter’: ‘He hates me’
He was being Riddikulus.
Daniel Radcliffe revealed Thursday that he once believed that Alan Rickman, who played the sinister potions master Severus Snape in the “Harry Potter” franchise, actually hated him.
“I was so intimidated by Alan Rickman. How can you not be by that voice?” Radcliffe, 34, declared during an appearance on the “Happy, Sad, Confused” podcast.
“I was so intimidated by him for the first three movies,” he said. “I was terrified by him and was like, ‘This guy hates me.’ Somewhere along the lines he saw that I really wanted to do this and work at it.”
According to the “Horns” alum, Rickman — who died at the age of 69 in 2016 after a battle with cancer — eventually became one of his biggest supporters and even once ended a vacation early so he could catch his friend in a Broadway show.
“He cut short a vacation in Canada to come and see me in ‘Equus.’ He saw every piece of stage work I did when he was alive,” Radcliffe recalled. “He would take me out afterwards and we would talk about it. He was one of the first people to say like, ‘You should look at voice coaching and investigate all this stuff.’”
Radcliffe, who was sitting with his “Merrily We Roll Along” costars Jonathan Groff and Lindsay Mendez, made the revelation after the podcast’s host played a clip of Rickman from 2016 praising Radcliffe’s dedication to the franchise.
“As much as I was doing it for seven weeks, they were doing it for 52 weeks,” Rickman said in the clip. “This was their life from 12 to 22. And you would watch it from the sidelines at times and throw the odd lifeline in because there was so little time for that.”
“It’s only in recent years that I’ve managed to sit down in a cafe with Daniel in New York,” the “Die Hard” star continued. “He was at a theater and I was at another. Huge pride to go to see him in the musical [‘How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying’]. How dare he be dancing as well as the New York dancers. He worked at it.”
The clip left Radcliffe, who was visibly moved, stupified.
“Thanks for showing that. I’ve never seen that before. Thank you,” he said.
Sadly, not all of Radcliffe’s relationships from the international franchise seem to be as happy as the one he had with the late actor.
On Thursday, Harry Potter” author Daniel Radcliffe ,slammed Radcliffe and fellow franchise star Emma Watson, 33, for speaking out against her and her comments opposing hormone blockers for transgender children.
“Just waiting for Dan and Emma to give you a very public apology … safe in the knowledge that you will forgive them …” one social media user wrote to the author.
“Not safe, I’m afraid,” Rowling, 58, responded.
Rowling went on to blast the celebrities who spoke out against her when she wrote an essay that was deemed transphobic in 2020.
Radcliffe later wrote a letter to The Trevor Project, an LGBTQ nonprofit organization, affirming his support for transgender rights and his disapproval of Rowling’s stance that same year.
“It’s clear that we need to do more to support transgender and nonbinary people, not invalidate their identities,” he said at the time.
Watson, who has been a staunch advocate for LGBTQ+ rights since she stopped portraying Hermione Granger, also chimed in.
“Trans people are who they say they are and deserve to live their lives without being constantly questioned or told they aren’t who they say they are,” the actress said.
Rupert Grint and “Fantastic Beasts” star Eddie Redmayne also shared their support for the transgender community.
Rowling, who recently said she’d “happily” do jail time for her beliefs, has repeatedly claimed that transgender women are not women.
The author has also taunted Scottish police to try to arrest her for misgendering people after a new hate crime law went into effect.
“Freedom of speech and belief are at an end in Scotland if the accurate description of biological sex is deemed criminal,” she wrote on X.
