Beyond the Wand

Extracted from Chapter 17

THE WEASLEBEES AT WORK or GOLFING WITH GRYFFINDORKS

Robbie Coltrane, who played Hagrid, was one of the few actors I recognised when we started making the Potter films, thanks to his roles in GoldenEye and Cracker. Perhaps more than anybody else, he understood the importance of keeping it lighthearted.

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Robbie was always keen to remind us that we weren’t there to cure cancer. We weren’t saving the world. We were simply making a film. We should remember that, not get too big for our boots and try to have a laugh along the way. He had a good dose of Hagrid in him: the big friendly giant who never lost sight of what was important in life.

In the Prisoner of Azkaban scene where Draco is kicked by Buckbeak, he has to be carried off by Hagrid. All sorts of crafty technical wizardry was employed to make Hagrid look like a giant. Most of my scenes with him were not played by Robbie, but by Martin Bayfield, a six-foot-ten rugby player in an enormous animatronic suit. (It was an incredibly hot costume to wear. Jamie and I were often told off for corpsing at the sight of steam coming out of Hagrid’s ears.) In this scene, however, Hagrid’s face was fully on display, so rather than make him very big, they had to make me very small. They created a dummy Draco about a quarter smaller than my actual size for Robbie to carry. This was no toy – it took months to build and cost tens of thousands of pounds – but naturally, like any kid, I was delighted by the idea of having a fake mini-me to play around with. My immediate plan was to take it to a car park, wait for someone to reverse and then throw it behind the car. Somehow I managed to restrain myself from carrying out that practical joke, but my mum was on set that day and I did take special pains to freak her out with the spooky rubber Tom. Robbie joined in the fun. The more my mum squirmed at the thought of her youngest son immortalised in mannequin form, the more Robbie waved the decoy Draco in her direction, to the absolute hilarity of us all. That was Robbie through and through. He had a cutting sense of humour as an adult, but he was brilliant with the kids, too. (The dummy Draco is now happily retired and living out the rest of his days at the Potter studio tour at Leavesden.)

Robbie was also kind, and caring. In the first film, Hagrid takes Harry, Ron, Hermione and Draco into the Forbidden Forest. Part of that scene was shot in the studio where they built the Forbidden Forest. Part of it, though, was on location and required a night shoot. I have a distinct memory of sitting on a plastic tarp on the floor at two in the morning in a cold forest with Daniel, Rupert and Emma. Emma was only nine years old and she was curled up asleep next to me while we waited for them to set up the next shot. But while everybody was frantically going about their business, it was Robbie who kept spirits high and made sure that we were comfortable and warm and well looked after.