Rupert Grint, Ron Weasley’s shadow and the future of Harry Potter

For some actors, an iconic role feels like a weight they spend the rest of their careers trying to shake. For Rupert Grint, the man who grew up as Ron Weasley in the Harry Potter films, that shadow is more like a familiar old cloak: always there, sometimes a little heavy, but ultimately warm and full of memories. He knows he will never fully outrun Ron, and, as he explains, he is increasingly okay with that.

Speaking in a recent interview, Grint reflected on what it means to have the rest of your life defined by the character you played as a child.

The eight Harry Potter films didn’t just dominate a decade of his own youth; they helped shape an entire generation’s idea of friendship, courage and loyalty. Now a father himself, he has the surreal experience of watching that same story through his children’s eyes, seeing the magic that once changed his life now working on them too.

Grint admits that Ron’s presence in his life is permanent. The red hair, the awkward grin, the loyal best friend who cracks under pressure but always shows up in the end – all of it is etched into pop culture. Wherever he goes, people instinctively see the sidekick from Gryffindor before they see the man in front of them. Yet instead of resenting that, he frames it as a strange kind of privilege. Being forever linked to a character who meant so much to so many is, in his view, something to feel proud of, not something to run away from.

It helps, of course, that the Harry Potter franchise has left him financially secure in a way most working actors can only dream of. Fans joke that if they had his bank balance, they would happily live in Ron Weasley’s shadow forever, coasting on wizard royalties while strangers shout ‘Another Weasley!’ across the street. Grint has never leaned into that caricature of the spoiled former child star, but there is a quiet realism in his attitude. There are countless young actors who leave a hit series with nothing but nostalgia and typecasting issues; to have both a beloved legacy and a stable future is hardly the worst outcome.

The question of typecasting inevitably comes up. From Frodo to Luke Skywalker, pop culture is filled with performers who will always be remembered first for one defining part. Some spend years running from it, loudly announcing that they have moved on and bristling whenever that old character’s name is mentioned. Grint, by contrast, seems more relaxed. He has picked smaller, quirkier projects, dipped into theatre and television, and quietly built a life away from blockbuster sets, without treating Ron as something to be disowned or erased.

That sense of acceptance extends to the next generation stepping into Hogwarts. With HBO’s new Harry Potter television series in production, the franchise is being rebuilt from the ground up. A new trio of children will grow up in the roles that once belonged to Grint, Daniel Radcliffe and Emma Watson, starting with the adaptation of the first book that is scheduled to arrive in 2027. Rather than guarding Ron like a jealous trademark, Grint has quite literally passed the wand on: he wrote a letter to 11-year-old Alastair Stout, the young actor now tasked with bringing Ron to life for a new audience.

In that letter, Grint says he simply wished Stout joy. He remembers how overwhelming and exhilarating it was to step into a fully formed magical world at that age, and he hopes the new Ron is allowed to have just as much fun as he did. For fans who grew up with the films, the idea of a different face in that familiar maroon jumper is still controversial, and even original movie director Chris Columbus has questioned whether a straight retelling can escape constant comparison. Grint’s attitude is notably more generous: to him, the series is a whole new thing with space to become its own story, even if it treads familiar ground.

That calm, measured tone is also why he sidestepped questions about the latest turbulence around the franchise’s creator. Asked about the public clash between Emma Watson and J.K. Rowling, Grint chose not to wade into the culture war. In an era when every quote is clipped, shared and weaponised within minutes, silence can be a form of self-preservation as much as diplomacy. For a man who has spent most of his life watched by the same global fandom, picking fights in headlines clearly doesn’t interest him.

Meanwhile, former co-stars continue to revisit the wizarding world in their own ways. Tom Felton recently returned to Draco Malfoy on stage, leaning into nostalgia to delight fans and earning public praise from Radcliffe. Naturally, that prompts the inevitable question: could Grint ever see himself slipping back into Ron’s robes for a future project, whether on screen or on stage? His answer is a familiar industry cliché – never say never – but it lands differently coming from someone so clearly at peace with his past.

For now, he seems content keeping Ron in a special, slightly distant corner of his life. He can watch the films with his kids, reminisce with old castmates, and let a new generation discover the story in a fresh form. If he never plays Ron again, the character still lives on in the collective memory of millions of viewers, and that shadow he talks about is not something to escape so much as something to live alongside. For an actor whose career began with a letter, a casting call and a dream of Hogwarts, there are far worse fates than being the world’s favourite Weasley forever.