Harry Potter encourages new generation of Hogwarts students on HBO

Katie Leung has had a remarkable career in visual and audio media. She has voiced Caitlyn in Arcane on Netflix and Ling in the podcast1984. She is going to be playing Lady Araminta Gun in the hit historical romance Bridgerton's next season. Before all of that, she was a teenage Scottish actress who turned Harry Potter into a babbling goofball in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. As Ravenclaw Quidditch star and winsome love interest of Cedric Diggory, Katie appeared first in the fourth movie and in the series finale seven years later. She recently spoke to the future actors of the Harry Potter universe and had some keen advice.

What does Katie say to the next Hogwarts students?

Kate Harold of GamingBIBLE caught up with Katie at the BAFTA Game Awards on April 8 in London. Leung recalled what it was like to have the weight of participation in such a noteworthy project:

"I remember feeling really scared, because it's going to be such a huge budgeted show and there's going too be so many people involved."

Katie Leung

Such fear is understandable. The movies were already a success and while such film legends as Richard Harris, Emma Thompson, Alan Rickman, and Maggie Smith to name a few took on the roles of the adults inn the series, it was a starting-out point for many adolescent actors. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban did not give us Cho Chang's introduction, so I was thrilled to see a trailer that featured Harry's nervousness around a pretty Ravenclaw student. Her emotional range was on full display in the film as she ended it in a moving portrayal of grief. She probably felt a lot of pressure to live up to her ink and paper counterpart.

To the rising generation of Potter actors, she said, "I think it's really important to remember to be true to how you want to play a character and just don't let outer voices get to you." As the series will have time across episodes and seasons for the actors to grow into their roles gradually, this seems like solid advice. She went on to say that "You've been cast for a reason, for a very good reason. Just roll with it." She later encouraged them to "Just have fun...[and] remember that there are going to be a lot of people but what matters most in the end is to be vulnerable and open to exploring.

What wonderful words of empathy ad wisdom. We look forward to hearing who will be cast in the upcoming adaptation by HBO.