Rupert Grint, who starred as Ron Weasley in all eight “Harry Potter” movies, will play the identical position on Broadway, beginning early subsequent 12 months.
Grint will be part of the solid of “Harry Potter and the Cursed Little one,” a sequel to the novels and movies that has been working on Broadway since 2018. Grint plans to begin performances on Feb. 2, and has dedicated to a 17-week run, by way of Could 30.
The actor was simply 11 years outdated when he landed the movie position, enjoying one in all Harry’s two closest pals. He’s now 38, and his character is a husband and a father.
“I can’t wait to fulfill him once more on this stage of life,” Grint mentioned in an announcement. “There’s something so full-circle and so particular about stepping again into Ron’s sneakers now once we are each fathers; it’s by some means each very acquainted and fully new.”
Grint, who because the Harry Potter films has labored primarily in movie and tv, has one earlier Broadway credit score: In 2014, he was a part of the solid for successful revival of Terrence McNally’s “It’s Solely a Play.”
Grint’s “Cursed Little one” stint will start a month after the tip of a 14-month run within the present by Tom Felton, who as a baby performed the bullying Draco Malfoy within the movies, and who now performs that character, with an improved character, as an grownup onstage. (The play is about 19 years after the principle motion of the ultimate novel.)
Felton’s tenure has supplied a exceptional enhance to the play, which had stalled on the field workplace earlier than his casting. Weekly grosses doubled upon Felton’s arrival final November, and have remained elevated — they dip noticeably throughout his occasional absences for holidays or for work on different tasks. And the scene on the stage door has change into significantly extra crowded, reflecting the keenness of the big Harry Potter fan base.
Grint is a good greater star within the Harry Potter cosmos, as a result of he performed one of many core three characters within the movies, so it appears doubtless that his run may even show to be a monetary boon for the present, which, on the time of its opening, was the costliest nonmusical play ever to open on Broadway.
The roles taken on by Felton and Grint, though key to the movies, are much less central within the play, which focuses on the following era of wizards. However followers clearly expertise a nostalgic rush from seeing actors they first encountered as kids grown up alongside their characters.
The play started its life in 2016 in London’s West Finish, with a two-part manufacturing that’s nonetheless working. The Broadway run started as a two-part present, however after the coronavirus pandemic it was streamlined to 1 half, after which in 2024 that single half was additional trimmed to cut back its working time (and working prices).
The present — written by Jack Thorne, directed by John Tiffany and produced by Sonia Friedman and Colin Callender — received six Tony Awards, together with for greatest play. The New York manufacturing has bought 4.1 million tickets and grossed $532 million, greater than another nonmusical play in Broadway historical past.
Along with London (which is switching to the one-part manufacturing in October) and New York, there are at present productions in Tokyo and the Netherlands and a touring manufacturing in North America. Globally, the present has bought 14 million tickets.