He just wanted to do “normal stuff”.
Harry Potter actor Rupert Grint has explained that he almost quit the franchise after the film series’ fourth instalment.
Speaking with The Independent, the Ron Weasley actor said that in the aftermath of The Goblet of Fire he felt stressed by being in the public eye.
“I had just finished my GCSEs,” he told the paper.
“I thought, ‘Do I actually want to keep doing this? It’s a bit of a drag.’ Because obviously it’s a big sacrifice. You take for granted anonymity, just doing normal stuff, just going out. Everything was different and a little bit scary. There were times when I was like ‘I’m done.’”
He added that he hated the constant attention he received from photographers and was bothered by fans requests for selfies.
“It’s almost like having a split personality,” he said.
“Sometimes it can be quite dehumanising to have people just taking pictures of you when you’re out. To them, you are just this one thing. It’s a weird existence. But that’s my life.
“I can’t really remember life before it. In a weird way, you become blasé about it. It becomes normal and you adapt.”
Since leaving Potter behind, Grint has turned his attention to more serious roles, including playing the chaotic con man Charlie Cavendish in Snatch, a remake of the Guy Richie 2000 classic.
But despite what you might assume, he claims that he hasn’t consciously chosen more ‘adult’ roles in order to escape people’s expectation of him as a young wizard.
“I’m not desperate to shock and make people completely forget,” he says.
“I don’t think you can. Those films were such a unique beast. It’s going to be hard to make people completely forget. You just have to embrace them.”
