Being part of a major franchise like Harry Potter can be an exciting opportunity for an actor, but it can also be a nerve-wracking experience. With a large built-in fan base eagerly anticipating the next installment, the creative team is under a significant amount of pressure to deliver a high-quality product. So much work goes into ensuring every little detail is just right before the cameras roll. Actors arguably have the most challenging job, as they’re tasked with bringing beloved characters to life. They have to strike a balance between doing the source material justice and putting their own spin on things. Every actor’s dream is for things to go smoothly on set, but that didn’t happen for Domhnall Gleeson.
During an appearance on Late Night With Seth Meyers, Gleeson recalled the terrible first day he had on the Harry Potter set. The Irish actor attempted to do an English accent for his portrayal of Bill Weasley and it didn’t go very well. “I went Australian and I couldn’t stop,” Gleeson said. “And I went Australian on the first take and there were like 300 people on set, and the director was like, ‘Cut!’ and this weird, long pause. And the director came over and was like, ‘So you’ve gone Australian … is there anything you can do?’ … it was one of the worst days of my life. And then things got a little bit better.”
Domhnall Gleeson Had a Small Role in the Harry Potter Movies
In the book series, Bill Weasley made his first appearance in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, but the character’s on-screen counterpart played a much smaller role in the story. Gleeson portrayed Bill in just two films: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1 and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2. By the time he joined the cast, the franchise had long been established as a global phenomenon. All of the previous movies had achieved tremendous box office success, establishing Harry Potter as one of the defining film series of a generation.
Gleeson has very little screen time across the two films and only a handful of lines. One of the more notable sequences he was a part of is early on in Deathly Hallows – Part 1 where several of Harry’s allies take polyjuice potion to transform themselves into Harry and trick Voldemort’s forces. Bill also participates in the Battle of Hogwarts during the film’s epic finale.
Even though Bill didn’t have much to do in the movies (something that will hopefully be rectified by HBO’s Harry Potter TV show, which has already cast several members of the Weasley family), Gleeson took his role seriously and wanted to do the best job possible. All of the other Weasleys had British accents, so it would have been strange if one sibling had a different dialect. Nerves likely played a part in Gleeson sliding into Australian territory. Then a relative unknown, the actor probably felt the pressure joining a massive franchise for the final installments.
Fortunately, once he got that first Australian take out of his system, Gleeson was able to speak with an English accent. Again, he only has a few lines in his two films, and his voice for Bill never came off as distracting. Ultimately, he fit right in with the rest of the on-screen Weasleys, convincingly portraying the family’s eldest child. It’s a shame that such a talented actor had minimal screen time, and it would have been fun to see what Gleeson could have done if the films’ version of Bill was more accurate to the source material.