Gary Oldman says he was 'mediocre' in Harry Potter as Alan Rickman had advantage

30 December 2023 , 14:25

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Gary Oldman says he was 'mediocre' in Harry Potter as Alan Rickman had advantage

Gary Oldman has revealed he believes his Harry Potter performance was less than brilliant, describing his role in the hit film as "mediocre".

The 65-year-old appeared as Sirius Black in the franchise, but has admitted that he wishes he had at least read the books to get a better sense of his character, like co-star Alan Rickman, who played Professor Snape. But although he looks back with regret, he admits the film came at the right time for him, as he was going through a messy divorce.

Chatting with Josh Horowitz on the latest episode of podcast Happy Sad Confused, the actor confessed: "I think my work is mediocre in it."

Gary Oldman as Sirius Black in "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban." (Press Association)

Comparing himself to late Harry Potter star Rickman, who died in January 2016, he added: "Maybe if I had read the books like Alan, if I had got ahead of the curve, if I had known what's coming, I honestly think I would have played it differently."

But at the time, he was understandably preoccupied with the ending of his dysfunctional marriage to model Donya Fiorentino, in which he was granted full custody of the couple's children.

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Speaking recently on The Drew Barrymore Show, he told the actress: "Thank God for Harry Potter. I tell you, the two — Batman and Harry Potter — really, they saved me, because it meant that I could do the least amount of work for the most amount of money and then be home with the kids."

Gary debuted as Sirius Black in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, released in 2004, before reprising the role in two more of the films, before being killed in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix in 2007.

Alan Rickman as Severus Snape in the franchise - he was the only actor to have a steer on all the JK Rowling books prior to filming (Warner Brothers)

In the podcast, Gary joked that his character shouldn't have been killed off so early, adding: "We [the cast] were all taking bets [on which character would die], you know, it’s Hagrid, and I was there going, no, no, no, maybe it’s Ron. And then you kind of open the script and you go, it’s me. I’m out of here."

The three-time Oscar winner also admitted that he can be a perfectionist when it comes to his work, telling Josh: "I’ll tell you what it is. It’s like anything, I think if I sat and watched myself in something and said, 'My God, I’m amazing', that would be a very sad day, because you want to make the next thing better... It’s so subjective. It’s such a personal thing that you’re looking at that other people are not seeing…

"It’s not to disrespect someone who says to me, 'Oh, I really love you in that movie', and I’m thinking, 'I’m terrible in that movie. What are they talking about?'

"It’s not that. It’s [that] they’re seeing something else."

Amelia Ward