Tom Felton has revealed that he had absolutely no idea that his mocking pronunciation of the word Potters would become one of the most celebrated moments in Harry Potter history, and credits his older brothers with unknowingly teaching him how to do it.
Talking about Happy Sad Confused podcast on Thursday, March 26, the 38-year-old actor said of the now-famous delivery.
“I don’t know how it became an iconic thing. I certainly had no idea.” He traced the statement back to his childhood dynamics as the youngest of four brothers.
“I have three older brothers, so they’d all always call me something like maggot or round. Round of the pack. Because I was the youngest and the shortest by a lot. So I don’t remember ever giving it a second thought. But ‘Potter’, it just got more and more toxic.”
He marveled at the reaction it still elicited.
“All you have to do is say it in the company of a Potter fan and…goosebumps and like applause, something happens,” he said.
“I never knew any of these things would be iconic lines.”
Felton is currently back in Slytherin robes on Broadway playing Draco Malfoy Harry Potter and the Cursed Childwhich gathers 19 years after the events of The Deathly Hallows and follows the next generation of Hogwarts students.
He told podcast host Josh Horowitz that he has smuggled at least one of his most famous movie lines into the stage production, not through planning but instinct.
“I said it one time spontaneously during rehearsals, and John Tiffany, our amazing director, who’s been doing it for ten years, I could see his eyes light up and say, ‘Yeah. Put it back in.'”
The response from the audience has been predictable.
“Needless to say, quite a hit every night,” he added.
