Daniel Radcliffe beat out thousands of other kids in a massive talent search to score one
of the most coveted film roles of all time: heroic wizard Harry Potter in Warner Bros.'
film adaptations of J.K.
Rowling's monstrously successful Harry Potter series.
Radcliffe played Potter in eight blockbuster films, growing up on screen with his character.
By the time the final film in the franchise was released in 2011, Radcliffe was ready
to try something different - and he's still blazing his own unconventional path, often
outside of the spotlight.
Here's a look at the real reason you don't hear about Daniel Radcliffe anymore.
Indie darling
When one plays the title role in one of the highest-grossing and most famous movie franchises
of all time, all other movies look like micro-budgeted indies by comparison, but Radcliffe really
has been making mostly what one would call "small" or "quirky" films.
Among his daring choices are the romantic comedy What If, and the Allen Ginsberg biopic
Kill Your Darlings, plus Imperium, which features Radcliffe as an FBI agent posing as a white
supremacist, and Jungle, where he plays an adventurer lost in a jungle.
Not to mention Horns, where he plays… well, a guy who suddenly grows horns.
But Radcliffe's most famous post-Potter movie is also his most infamous post-Potter movie:
Swiss Army Man.
Radcliffe plays a pale, bloated corpse that helps Paul Dano get off of a desert island
… by serving as a human raft that traverses the sea via the propulsive power of his own
rigor mortis induced farts.
When it screened at the Sundance Film Festival in 2016, Variety reported that
"a continuous stream of audience members kept standing up and bolting for the door throughout
the film."
Mainstream meh
Though Radcliffe has spent most of the decade doing indie films, he has branched out into
bigger budget fare occasionally, and the results have been a mixed bag.
2011's The Woman in Black was a minor horror hit, but his return to the genre in 2015's
Victor Frankenstein didn't fare as well, earning just $5.7 million domestically.
And his attempt to play against type as a villainous magician in 2016's Now You See
Me 2 was a bit of a disappointment at the domestic box office, though overseas profits
ultimately made it a winner.
Stage presence
Radcliffe isn't just some child star who lucked into a plum role that made him world famous
and rich for life, he's a real actor, meaning he can handle starring in a Broadway show.
During a break from Potterland in 2008, he earned raves in the role as the extremely
troubled, horse-obsessed Alan Strang in a revival of Peter Schaffer's dark play Equus.
Then, in 2011, he starred in a Broadway revival of the classic musical How to Succeed in Business
Without Really Trying.
And in 2014, he wowed critics again with a three-month stint in the tragicomedy The Cripple
of Inishmaan proving the stage is just as much his home as Hogwarts was.
He's in love!
Radcliffe and his longtime partner, American actress Erin Darke, fell for each other in
the most Hollywood way possible, while filming a love scene together.
It happened in 2012, while filming Kill Your Darlings, and the two have been together ever
since, with rumors swirling that they may even be secretly engaged!
"C'mon!
Daniel Radcliffe!"
He doesn't need the money
Most actors are lucky if they star in one hugely successful blockbuster.
By his early 20's, Radcliffe had already starred in eight.
Combined, the Harry Potter movies brought in nearly $8 billion worldwide, and Radcliffe
was paid handsomely for helping the juggernaut along, with his net worth estimated to be
over $100 million.
And that means Radcliffe doesn't have to do anything unless he feels like it.
He told the Belfast Telegraph,
"I'm very grateful for it, because having money means you don't have to worry about
it, which is a very lovely freedom to have.
It also gives me immense freedom, career-wise."
He might play Harry Potter again
All of J.K.
Rowling's original Harry Potter novels have been adapted to film, and Warner Bros. plans
to make five movies in the prequel Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them series, but
there's one Wizarding World property that's yet to hit screens: Harry Potter and the Cursed
Child.
Taking place years after the events of the novels, the stage play enjoyed a successful
run on London's West End and hit Broadway in 2018.
Surprisingly, there isn't a movie version in the works yet, but if it transpires, Radcliffe
told the Hollywood Reporter that though he likely won't play Harry again, he hasn't entirely
ruled it out.
"I'm never going to close the door; that would be a stupid thing to do.
But I think I'll be happy enough and secure enough to let someone else play it."