Tom Felton honors late Robbie Coltrane on his birthday: 'Without Hagrid, there's no Hogwarts'
Tom Felton is remembering his late Harry Potter costar Robbie Coltrane on what would have been his 73rd birthday.
In an essay penned for E! News, Felton, who played Draco Malfoy in the franchise, recounted memories with the "endlessly playful" and "always kind" Coltrane, who died last October from multiple organ failure.
"In the early days of Harry Potter, the cast comprised two distinct groups: children and adults. Emma Watson was 9 when we started shooting; Dan Radcliffe was 11; I was 13," Felton wrote. "Maggie Smith and Richard Harris, by comparison, were in their sixties and seventies. Do the math: You were either one of the kids, or you were one of the grown-ups."
Warner Bros. Pictures Robbie Coltrane and Tom Felton in 'Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone'
"Unless, that is, you were Robbie Coltrane," he continued. Somehow, Coltrane maintained "a foot in both camps" and "managed to be an adult and a child at the same time," Felton recounted. His "knowledge of the world" — from engineering to geography, from history to travel — was "astounding," Felton said, and "you could tell that the older actors valued and respected his experience."
Though Coltrane "had the mind of an adult," he "truly had the heart of a child," Felton added, recounting an "intimidating" first table read for the first film, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, where Coltrane and Watson decided to play a joke during introductions: "Before we started, we all introduced ourselves: 'I'm Dan, and I'll be playing Harry Potter.' 'I'm Tom, and I'll be playing Draco Malfoy.'"
He added, "Robbie and Emma were sitting side by side. When their turn came, he persuaded her to swap characters. 'I'm Emma and I'll be playing Rubeus Hagrid.' 'I'm Robbie and I'll be playing Hermione Granger.' We all giggled into our scripts as this huge, friendly, charming, smiling man reminded us with that one little joke that we should approach this endeavor with a sense of fun. We were only making a film. We weren't saving lives."
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Still, Coltrane was a "true professional," and the young cast "learned our trade from watching him," Felton wrote, adding that Coltrane never took himself too seriously. "Because if Robbie took himself too seriously, if he forgot what it meant to be kind, there would have been no Hagrid. Without Hagrid, there's no Hogwarts. And nobody could, would or ever will play that gentle giant half as well as my dearly missed friend Robbie Coltrane."
Prior to his passing, Coltrane reunited with his former costars for the HBO Max retrospective special Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts, released on New Year's Day 2022. On the impact of the film franchise, Coltrane said, "The legacy of the movies is that my children's generation will show them to their children. You can be watching it in 50 years time, easy. I'll not be here, sadly. But Hagrid will, yes."
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