UNITED KINGDON: Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe attends the premiere of the Victorian-era horror film The Woman in Black in which he takes on his first adult role

Record ID: 220714

  • Title: UNITED KINGDON: Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe attends the premiere of the Victorian-era horror film The Woman in Black in which he takes on his first adult role
  • Date: 25th January 2012
  • Summary: LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM (FILE - JULY 7 2011) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF ACTORS RUPERT GRINT, EMMA WATSON AND DANIEL RADCLIFFE AT THE PREMIERE OF HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS: PART 2
  • Embargoed: 9th February 2012 12:00
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  • Location: United Kingdom
  • Country: United Kingdom
  • Reuters ID: LVA94OECSJCMRVFLXV0MGZ6UV49W
  • Story Text: Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe walked the red carpet for the first movie in which he plays an adult role on Tuesday (January 24) at The Woman in Black's world premiere at London's Royal Festival Hall.
    The 22-year-old actor, who is inextricably linked to the boy wizard he played throughout the movie franchise, takes on the lead role in Victorian-era horror film.
    The movie is a step into the unknown for an actor who grew up on the set of one of Hollywood's most successful series.
    Instead of production budgets of $250 million or more, The Woman in Black cost an estimated $17 million to make. So is this an attempt at a reinvention for the actor?
    "I don't know reinvention. It seems a little early in my life to be reinventing myself," Radcliffe told Reuters Television.
    One of the attractions of playing Arthur Kipps, a young lawyer and father mourning the death of his wife, was the obvious break with what went before.
    "Obviously it's the first film after Potter. I look very different -- it's a very different type of film. I don't really think of it as a reinvention, it's just more of like the first step in the rest of my career," he said.
    In The Woman in Black, Kipps is forced to leave his three-year-old son and travel to a remote village on the east coast of England to look into the legal affairs of the recently deceased owner of Eel Marsh House, a creepy mansion cut off from the mainland when the tide rises.
    He discovers a dark family secret that helps explain the appearance of a mysterious phantom woman dressed in black who beckons children to an early grave.
    Despite the ghostly goings-on, Kipps keeps returning to the old house.
    "It's interesting because I think it's less bravery than curiosity because if he can confirm that this is in fact what he's seeing is a ghost, then that means there is an afterlife and that means he will somehow, there is a possibility that he will be back with his wife again, so it's less bravery as just not really caring if one dies," Radcliffe said of his character.
    The film is based on a novel by Susan Hill that was adapted into a successful West End play, still running in London.
    Throughout the Harry Potter series Radcliffe earned mixed reviews, although any negative comments did nothing to deter record audiences.
    His two main stage roles -- Equus in 2007 and How to Succeed In Business Without Really Trying in 2011 were generally well-received, particularly Equus.
    Soon Radcliffe will learn what the critics make of his latest work.
    "I don't really spend my time thinking about what they're thinking about. It's not a really constructive way for me to think. I just have to do my job on set the day I do it," he said.
    The new grown-up look he adopted for the movie, replete with Victorian-style facial hair was, he revealed, a simple transformation.
    "It doesn't take me long to grow facial hair for some reason. I'm quite a hairy person - so it was easy, easy!" he explained.
    Radcliffe's co-star in The Woman in Black the veteran actor Ciaran Hinds said he has high expectations of Radcliffe's post-Potter career.
    "He's many strings to his bow, he's a lot of arrows in his quiver I think and more to come and of course he's so young but that gives him time for development. And to me, you know I haven't seen him tonight, but to me he doesn't seem to be sitting on where he is already, he's having to push and keep developing and that can only augur well for him as an actor in the future," he said.
    Looking ahead, Radcliffe said he was spending time researching for a new movie which starts shooting in March called Kill Your Darlings. In the film he'll play a 19-year-old Allen Ginsberg.
    "I've started breaking down the script and am doing a lot of biography reading at the moment, so yeah that's kind of what I'm doing in my spare time," he said.
    The Woman in Black hits theatres in Britain on Feb. 10 and a week earlier in the United States.
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