"Harry Potter" actor Daniel Radcliffe has issued a response to series creator J.K. Rowling's steady stream of anti-transgender remarks.
Speaking to The Atlantic about his role in the Broadway musical, "Merrily We Roll Along," Radcliffe addressed Rowling's controversial comments.
“It makes me really sad, ultimately,” Radcliffe said. “I do look at the person that I met, the times that we met, and the books that she wrote, and the world that she created, and all of that is to me so deeply empathic.”
Radcliffe also noted that he has not had any director contact with her since 2020 when she first shared her first public sentiments against transgender people. The actor at the time published a brief essay for the "Trevor Project," in which he indicated his allyship with the trans community. "Transgender women are women," Radcliffe wrote.
“I wanted to try and help people that had been negatively affected by the comments. And to say that if those are Jo’s views, then they are not the views of everybody associated with the ‘Potter’ franchise,” Radcliffe said.
He acknowledged that "Harry Potter" would "not have happened without” Rowling, adding, “so nothing in my life would have probably happened the way it is without that person.” However, Radcliffe also argued that “that doesn’t mean that you owe the things you truly believe to someone else for your entire life.”
Earlier this month, Rowling hit out at Radcliffe and "Harry Potter" co-star Emma Watson for previously expressing support for transgender people. "Celebs who cosied up to a movement intent on eroding women's hard-won rights and who used their platforms to cheer on the transitioning of minors can save their apologies for traumatised detransitioners and vulnerable women reliant on single sex spaces," Rowling wrote on X/Twitter.
