Daniel Radcliffe

• 1. Introduction

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  Daniel Radcliffe, an English actor born on the 23rd of July 1989, played Harry Potter in all eight films of the series between 2001 and 2011. When he was around 14 or 15, he and his co-stars Emma Watson and Rupert Grint were offered the chance to star in a remake of The Wizard of Oz. All three turned it down. Radcliffe remembered his reaction this way: "I don't know a lot about the world, but this is a bad idea and it should not be made."

  That refusal says something about a performer who was handed a famous role as a child and then had to decide what came next. The questions are practical ones. How did a London boy end up in the part? What did a decade with one character do to his schooling, his habits and his finances? And what did he choose to do once the wands were put away?

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• 2. Becoming Harry

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  Daniel Jacob Radcliffe was born at Queen Charlotte's and Chelsea Hospital in the Hammersmith district of London. He was the only child of Marcia Jeannine Gresham, a casting agent, and Alan George Radcliffe, a literary agent. His mother is Jewish, was born in South Africa and was raised in Westcliff-on-Sea in Essex. Her ancestors were Ashkenazi Jewish immigrants from Germany, Lithuania, Poland and Russia.

  His father grew up in Banbridge in County Down, in what Radcliffe has called a "very working-class" Protestant family. In 2019 he explored both sides of that family history in the BBC genealogy series Who Do You Think You Are? Both of his parents had acted as children. His mother's casting work had included BBC productions such as The Inspector Lynley Mysteries.

  At the age of five, Radcliffe first said that he wanted to act. A casting agent who was a friend of his mother's secured him an audition. At ten he made his acting debut in BBC One's two-part adaptation of Charles Dickens's novel David Copperfield, broadcast in 1999. He played the title character as a boy. His film debut came in 2001 with The Tailor of Panama, an American film based on John le Carré's 1996 spy novel. It was a moderate commercial success.

  In 2000, the producer David Heyman met Radcliffe at the theatre, where the boy was with his father. Heyman was a friend of the elder Radcliffe, a well-known literary agent. He asked the boy to audition for Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, the film of J. K. Rowling's best-selling book.

  Rowling had been searching for an unknown British actor. The director Chris Columbus watched a video of Radcliffe in David Copperfield and recalled thinking, "This is what I want. This is Harry Potter." After several auditions over eight months, Radcliffe was chosen. Rowling approved, saying, "I don't think Chris Columbus could have found a better Harry."

  His parents first turned the offer down. They had been told it would mean six films shot in Los Angeles. Warner Bros. came back with a two-film contract and filming in the UK instead. Radcliffe was unsure, at that point, whether he would want to act in more than two.

  The Philosopher's Stone came out in 2001 and was both popular and well reviewed. Bob Graham of the San Francisco Chronicle wrote that "Radcliffe is the embodiment of every reader's imagination." The pay was a seven-figure salary, which Radcliffe called "not that important" to him. His parents chose to invest the money on his behalf.

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• 3. Ten Years of Hogwarts

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  Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets followed a year after the first film. Reviewers liked the lead performances but were divided about the film as a whole. For the third film, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban in 2004, A. O. Scott of The New York Times criticised Radcliffe. Scott felt that Emma Watson had to carry him. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire in 2005 was the second-highest grossing film of the series at that point. Radcliffe credited its humour for the creative success.

  Then the series wobbled. Radcliffe, Watson and Grint all hesitated to sign on for more films, which put the franchise's future in question. By March 2007, Radcliffe had agreed to continue. His signature ended weeks of press speculation that he would be denied the role because of his involvement in a stage play called Equus.

  All the while, his schooling took place at three private boys' schools in London: Redcliffe School, Sussex House School and the City of London School. After the first film, some classmates turned hostile. Radcliffe insists they were not jealous and were only trying to "have a crack at the kid that plays Harry Potter". As filming took over, on-set tutors filled the gaps. He admits he was not a strong student and found the work "really difficult". In 2006 he took three AS level exams and earned A grades. He then took a break from education and never went to university, partly because he already knew he wanted to be an actor and screenwriter.

  For financial and scripting reasons, the last book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, was split into two films shot back-to-back. Fans criticised the decision. Radcliffe defended it, arguing that the novel could not have been properly adapted as a single film. Part 1 reached cinemas in November 2010 and grossed $960 million. Part 2 followed in July 2011 and took more than $1.3 billion worldwide. As of May 2019 it ranked as the 11th-highest-grossing film of all time.

  Critics were warm about Part 2 and about Radcliffe. Ann Hornaday of The Washington Post asked who could have predicted that the three young leads would turn out to be good actors. Rex Reed remarked, "Frankly, I'm sorry to see Radcliffe go." Roger Ebert praised the film but felt Radcliffe, Grint and Watson were "upstaged by the supporting actors".

  Radcliffe accepts that some people will never separate him from Harry, and says he is "proud to be associated with this film series forever". He has no wish to make more. When Rowling hinted at writing an eighth book, he answered, "It is very doubtful. I think 10 years is a long time to spend with one character." He also rejects the idea that he lost his childhood: "I've been given a much better perspective on life by doing Potter."

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• 4. Equus and Broadway

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  Radcliffe's first appearance on a professional stage came in 2002, when he was a celebrity guest in the West End production of The Play What I Wrote. It was directed by Kenneth Branagh, who had also appeared with him in the second Harry Potter film.

  At seventeen, Radcliffe wanted to show that he was ready for adult roles. He chose Peter Shaffer's play Equus at the Gielgud Theatre in the West End. The play had not been revived since its first run in 1973. Radcliffe took the lead role of Alan Strang, a stable boy with an obsession with horses. Advance sales topped £1.7 million.

  The production drew heavy media interest before it opened, because Radcliffe performed a nude scene. Equus opened on the 27th of February 2007 and ran until the 9th of June 2007. Critics were impressed by the nuance of a role so unlike Harry. Charles Spencer of The Telegraph wrote that Radcliffe "displays a dramatic power and an electrifying stage presence that marks a tremendous leap forward." Spencer added that there were moments when the actor seemed "genuinely scary in his rage and confusion."

  The production moved to Broadway in September 2008, at the Broadhurst Theatre. Radcliffe kept the lead and acted alongside Kate Mulgrew, Anna Camp and his Harry Potter co-star Richard Griffiths. He was nervous about the move, since he considered American audiences more discerning than those in London. His performance earned a Drama Desk Award nomination.

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• 5. Musicals and Plays

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  Late in 2010, Radcliffe voiced a character in The Simpsons episode "Treehouse of Horror XXI". In 2011 he returned to Broadway as J. Pierrepont Finch in a revival of the musical How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, at the Al Hirschfeld Theatre. Robert Morse and Matthew Broderick had played the part before him. The cast also included John Larroquette, Rose Hemingway and Mary Faber.

  Reviews of both the actor and the production were favourable. USA Today said he succeeded by working in harmony with his castmates instead of overshadowing them. He received nominations for a Drama Desk Award, a Drama League Award and an Outer Critics Circle Award. The show won nine Tony Award nominations, and the cast recording brought Radcliffe a Grammy Award nomination for Best Musical Theater Album. He left the production on the 1st of January 2012.

  In 2013, Martin McDonagh's dark comedy The Cripple of Inishmaan was revived at the Noël Coward Theatre in London. Radcliffe played the lead, Billy Claven, and won the WhatsOnStage Award for Best Actor in a Play. The show reached Broadway in 2014. He also appeared off-Broadway at The Public Theater in a documentary theatre piece called Privacy, playing The Writer. London revivals followed of Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead in 2017 and Samuel Beckett's Endgame in 2020.

  In 2018, Radcliffe returned to Broadway in The Lifespan of a Fact at Studio 54, a ninety-minute comedy with Bobby Cannavale and Cherry Jones. It follows a determined young fact checker who clashes with his demanding editor and an unorthodox author. To prepare, Radcliffe spent a day in the fact-checking department of The New Yorker.

  Stephen Sondheim's Merrily We Roll Along brought him his biggest stage honour. Radcliffe played Charley Kringas alongside Jonathan Groff and Lindsay Mendez at the New York Theatre Workshop. Previews began on the 21st of November 2022, the show opened on the 12th of December 2022, and the limited run ended on the 8th of January 2023. It then moved to Broadway to wide acclaim and closed on the 7th of July 2024. Radcliffe won the Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Musical and another Grammy Award nomination. Sony Pictures Classics picked up a film version with the same cast, with a United States release date set for the 5th of December 2025.

  In February 2026 he took on the interactive one-man play Every Brilliant Thing at the Hudson Theatre, which earned him a second Tony nomination. In March 2026 it was announced that Mariska Hargitay of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit would replace him from May 2026.

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• 6. Beyond the Wand

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  On the 13th of April 2006, a portrait of Radcliffe by Stuart Pearson Wright was unveiled in an exhibition at the National Theatre. It was later moved to the National Portrait Gallery. Around that time he was already working outside the Potter films. He shot the Australian family drama December Boys in 2005, about four orphans, and it reached theatres in mid-September 2007. That year he co-starred with Carey Mulligan in My Boy Jack, an ITV television film. Radcliffe played an eighteen-year-old who goes missing in action in the First World War, and critics praised him. He also published poems under the pen name Jacob Gershon in the underground fashion magazine Rubbish. The name combined his middle name with the Hebrew version of his mother's maiden name, Gresham.

  His first project after Potter was the horror film The Woman in Black, released in the United States and Canada on the 3rd of February 2012 and in the UK a week later. It was adapted from Susan Hill's 1983 novel. Radcliffe played a man sent to handle the legal affairs of a woman who has just died, and he soon meets her ghost. He said he was "incredibly excited" to be involved and called the script "beautifully written".

  In 2013 he played the beat poet Allen Ginsberg in Kill Your Darlings, directed by John Krokidas. That year he also starred in the romantic comedy The F Word and in the dark fantasy Horns, directed by Alexandre Aja. Both of those films premiered at the 38th Toronto International Film Festival. In 2015 he played Igor in Victor Frankenstein, directed by Paul McGuigan and written by Max Landis. He also played Sam Houser, a founder of Rockstar Games, in the drama The Gamechangers.

  The year 2016 produced his strangest choices. In Now You See Me 2 he played a technological prodigy who turns out to be the main antagonist. He is revealed as the son of Michael Caine's character, Arthur Tressler. In Swiss Army Man he played Manny, a talkative corpse, opposite Paul Dano. In Imperium, with Toni Collette and Tracy Letts, he played Nate Foster, an idealistic FBI agent who goes undercover in a white supremacist group. The film holds 84% on Rotten Tomatoes.

  In 2017 he played Yossi Ghinsberg in the thriller Jungle, based on Ghinsberg's own best-selling memoir. In 2018 he played a pilot smuggling drugs across borders in Beast of Burden. In 2019 he began playing Craig in the TBS comedy series Miracle Workers, based on a book by Simon Rich. The show ran until 2023, with Radcliffe playing multiple roles over the seasons. He also voiced the secret agent Rex Dasher in the animated Playmobil: The Movie.

  In 2020 he starred in the action comedy Guns Akimbo and played Tim Jenkin in Escape from Pretoria. That thriller is based on a real prison escape in South Africa in 1979 by three young political prisoners. He also appeared as Prince Frederick in the Netflix special Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. On the 1st of January 2022 he rejoined other cast members for the HBO Max special Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts.

  In 2022 he played the villain Abigail Fairfax in The Lost City, opposite Sandra Bullock and Channing Tatum. He also played the musical satirist "Weird Al" Yankovic in Weird: The Al Yankovic Story, a biographical parody made for The Roku Channel. It earned him his first Primetime Emmy Award nomination and a nomination for a British Academy Television Award.

  He is set to appear opposite Lucas Hedges in the war thriller Trust the Man. In May 2025 it was announced that he would star in The Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins, a series produced by Tina Fey, with Tracy Morgan and Erika Alexander. The first episode premiered in January 2026, and in May 2026 the series was renewed for a second season.

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• 7. Causes and Convictions

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  Radcliffe first learned of The Trevor Project while performing Equus on Broadway in 2008. In 2009 he began filming public service announcements for the organisation, promoting awareness of gay teen suicide prevention. He has also contributed money to it. In a 2010 interview he said, "I have always hated anybody who is not tolerant of gay men or lesbians or bisexuals. Now I am in the very fortunate position where I can actually help or do something about it." The Trevor Project gave him its Hero Award in 2011 for his advocacy with LGBTQ youth.

  In June 2020, during controversy over remarks by Harry Potter author J. K. Rowling about transgender people, Radcliffe wrote an essay that The Trevor Project published. In it he voiced support for the transgender community. He also expressed regret that Rowling's statements had tarnished some fans' experience of the Harry Potter books.

  His favourite charity is Demelza House Children's Hospice in Sittingbourne, Kent. He designed the Cu-Bed for Habitat's VIP Kids range, a cube made of eight smaller ones that can become a bed, a chaise-longue or a chair. All of the royalties go to Demelza. He has urged fans to donate to its Candle for Care programme instead of giving him Christmas presents.

  In 2008 he was among several celebrities who donated their old glasses to an exhibit honouring victims of the Holocaust. During the Broadway run of Equus he auctioned a pair of jeans and other items from the show for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS. In 2011 he presented at the Gypsy of the Year competition. He has also made donations to Get Connected UK, a free, confidential national helpline for troubled young people.

  His politics have moved over time. Radcliffe backed the Liberal Democrats and endorsed Nick Clegg, then the party leader, in the 2010 general election. In 2012 he switched to Labour, citing disillusionment with Clegg and the Liberal Democrats in government and approval of Ed Miliband. In 2015 he endorsed Jeremy Corbyn's campaign for the Labour leadership. He told The Big Issue that Corbyn's sincerity was "what is making people sit up and get excited."

  In 2009 he called himself a "fierce patriot" while supporting a republic in place of the British monarchy, which he said "symbolized a lot of what is wrong with the country". He backs British unionism and opposed the 2014 Scottish independence referendum, because he "personally likes the UK being how it is".

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• 8. Private Life

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  Radcliffe was reported to have earned about £15 million for the sixth Harry Potter film and about £39 million for the last two combined. His total from the franchise is estimated at £75.4 million. The Sunday Times Rich List of 2006 put his fortune at £14 million, making him one of the richest young people in the UK. In March 2009 Forbes ranked him first on its "Most Valuable Young Stars" list. The Daily Telegraph measured his net worth at £30 million that April, and he was considered the richest teenager in England later that year. His current net worth is estimated at £95 million.

  In 2008 he revealed that he has a mild form of dyspraxia, a neurological disorder that sometimes stops him from writing or tying his shoelaces. He said, "I was having a hard time at school, in terms of being crap at everything, with no discernible talent." While filming Horns in 2013, he accidentally drank antifreeze and was "horrendously ill" for "a disgusting, feverish three days." In early 2026 he discussed having quit smoking after 20 years of smoking "pretty heavily".

  In August 2010 he became teetotal, after finding that he relied too much on alcohol while filming Half-Blood Prince. In March 2020 he talked about his teenage alcohol misuse on BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs. He credited his parents' support, and staying in his native England, with helping him cope with fame.

  On religion, he said in 2012: "There was never religious faith in the house. I think of myself as being Jewish and Irish, despite the fact that I'm English." He has called his family "Christmas tree Jews" and said he is "very proud of being Jewish". In 2009 he described himself as an atheist, and in 2019 as "agnostic leaning toward atheism".

  Radcliffe splits his time between Fulham in London and the West Village in Manhattan. He has been in a relationship with the American actress Erin Darke since 2012, after meeting her on the set of Kill Your Darlings. In 2024 he said that his parents, who had been married for 30 years, inspired him in that relationship. Their son was born in April 2023, and Radcliffe called fatherhood "the literal best thing that ever happened to me."

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