Chris Rankin Interview

From EDP24, 13 February 2001. Thanks goes to the Harry Potter Galleries (unfortunately, no longer active) for the transcript.

"One of my friends, Will Rist, who played Pilate in Jesus Christ Superstar, phoned me up because he had heard about auditions being held. He said he was going for it, why didn't I give it a go, too? I had the address for the auditions and thought I might as well go for it because I had as much chance as the 30,000 others who applied.

I just forgot about it, and six months later I had a call totally out of the blue asking me to come for an audition. I went to London, and it was just me, the casting director and a video camera. Four days later, I went to the studios at Leavesden near Watford and auditioned again in front of the producers and director using part of the script. Four days after that, I was told I had the part."

Obsessive secrecy on the part of Warner Brothers prevents Chris from revealing his character, but it was a role he actually suggested he might be suitable for when he first applied for the audition. "Anyone who knows me and knows Harry Potter will probably guess which character I'm playing," he said. "I'm a fifth-year pupil at Hogwarts, it's a substantial role and I'm in most of the scenes." [*coughs* Percy! *coughs*]

In the interview, Chris Rankin talks about the challenge of being in a 200-million-dollar movie: "I've come from shows at Northgate where we were working on a shoestring, to something where money doesn't matter. Doing camera work was difficult at first, but fortunately it didn't take long to get used to because it is hammered into you to ignore the camera at all costs."