Richard Harris

[serenadust]

--- In HPFGU-OTChatter at y..., "Amanda Geist" <editor at t...> wrote:
> The McGee (where you been?) said
> 
> > Harris was not very good as Dumbledore, I agree, no humor or
> > whimsy..but now perhaps we could think that maybe he was ill


Amanda added: 
> Or that he refused to read the books and thus kept himself from a 
great
> source of characterization, for which I still do not understand his
> rationale.

>From everything I've read and seem about Harris in articles and TV 
interviews, he simply *gloried* in being an ornery cuss all his 
life. Not reading the book seemed to me to be his characteristic 
resistance to being a "good boy."  For all the talent he had, I 
never thought that he took his gift very seriously.  I don't really 
think that he was the sort of actor who puts out all that much 
effort into getting a performance just right (unlike Rickman who 
seems to take his work very seriously in everything he does). There 
was even an anecdote in the Leaky Cauldron recently concerning his 
asking his agent if there way any way out of the 7 film HP 
committment (about which he constantly moaned) and the agent said 
something like, "yes there is...death."
I wonder if Harris just called his bluff.



The McGee again:
 
> > McKellan would be perfect, but perhaps he's concerned that he 
might
> > be type cast as a wizard....
> >
> > He was SO good as Gandalf.....

Then Amanda:
> Which is *precisely* the reason he'd be a bad choice as 
Dumbledore. It would
> be Hogwarts with Gandalf wandering around. I defy anyone to tell 
me that Ian
> McKellen with long white hair and beard, no matter if you dress 
him in a
> cocktail gown and tiara, would be *anyone* but Gandalf now. They 
need
> someone else. (someone like Peter O'Toole...)


I must agree with you here, Amanda.  I also truly doubt that 
McKellen would take the part after 3 consecutive (or one continuous) 
wizard role(s).  I really like your Peter O'Toole suggestion and 
wish I had thought of him.  He could be a delightful Dumbledore. I 
haven't seen him in anything lately, so I hope he's well.


Jo Serenadust, highly impressed with Amanda's casting record and 
hoping she's right again