Daniel Radcliffe: ‘People Expect Me To Be An Absolute A–hole’


Daniel Radcliffe, now an adult, is as far removed from the child star stereotype as one can possibly get. Unlike many that shared his situation, Radcliffe hasn’t succumbed to the pressures of a lifetime in the spotlight by turning to alcohol and drugs or by managing his finances so poorly as to end up a street beggar. Instead, Daniel has turned childhood fame into a well-balanced adult career.

Daniel Radcliffe Loved His Harry Potter Days

Daniel Radcliffe, Harry Potter
Daniel Radcliffe as Harry Potter in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (2001). Image courtesy of Warner Bros.

To say that Mr. Radcliffe liked being the Harry Potter star would be a gross understatement to say the least. In fact, seeing co-stars mumbling around and looking forlorn at the prospect of another day on a Harry Potter set baffled Daniel’s mind. For Radcliffe, it was a tremendously positive experience, and, as Daniel lists off things like merely being on set to the hours and the people, the Harry Potter actor says he loved everything about the experience.

“The most underrated way I and all the producers on Potter got lucky was that I f–king loved the work,” said Mr. Radcliffe, according to E! News. “I loved the crazy, weird s–t I got to do every day.”

Yet, Daniel confessed that he really had no idea that the Harry Potter films, which began with The Sorcerer’s Stone in 2001, would have such a lasting impact on American pop culture or on his own life. Radcliffe said that he’d imagined the fame and popularity he garnered during the Potter films would fizzle out, once the last film had come and gone, but he soon found out just how mistaken he was about the Harry Potter legacy. Daniel recounts going out to pubs just for the occasional night out and finding that there was no longer any such thing as anonymity, as the other pub patrons all reached for their phones to snap photos of Radcliffe.

“Eventually you accept that you have to adapt how you live.”

Daniel Radcliffe Discovers That Child Stars Have A Bad Reputation

Victor-Frankenstein, Daniel-Radcliffe
Daniel Radcliffe on the set of the upcoming ‘Victor Frankenstein.’ Image courtesy of 20th Century Fox.

Moving past Harry Potter, Daniel Radcliffe discovered that he had earned a reputation, just for being a child actor, when he befriended the hair and make-up artists on the set of 2007’s December Boys. After he had gotten to know the team, Daniel finally mustered up the courage to ask something few of us are ever brave enough to ask the people we meet.

“After a few weeks, I said, ‘So, honestly, what did you expect when you were going to get me?’ And they said, ‘We thought you were going to be a d–k.’ Because that’s the notion people have in their heads of child stars,” Mr. Radcliffe says. “People expect me to be an absolute a–hole. And when I’m not, that always plays in my favor.”

Daniel acknowledges that he’s grown past those Harry Potter days and has successfully integrated himself into the Hollywood lifestyle, all of which served him well, when he met his new real life love interest, Erin Darke. Radcliffe and Darke met on the set of 2013’s Kill Your Darlings. In fact, Daniel reveals that he was flirting with Erin throughout the film’s love scene, adding that, from his part, there was no acting in that scene.

“There’s a moment when she makes me laugh, and I’m laughing as me and not as my character,” Daniel added. “She was incredibly funny and smart. I knew I was in trouble.”

The film, which tells the tale of writers William S. Burroughs and Jack Kerouac, brought Darke together with Radcliffe in 2012, reports US Weekly, though the couple kept the romance secret until they were outed at an N.Y.C. afterparty, following the Tony awards in June 2014.

Daniel Radcliffe’s next big project, Victor Frankenstein, will hit theaters on November 25.

[Featured image by Jason Merritt/Getty Images]

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