The Movies > Promotional Materials: Robbie Coltrane

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY
26 October 2001

Tremendous Talent

Great Scot Robbie Coltrane looms large in From Hell and the upcoming Harry Potter.

By Daniel Fierman

Robbie Coltrane explodes into his favorite Indian restaurant in London. A towering, almost impossibly large man, he offers a quick "hullohowd'yado" to a stunned maitre d', a slap on the back to a suddenly Lillitputian journalist, and then twiddles his fingers over a sprawling buffet. He gathers up a steaming platter of chicken tikka, savory nan, rice, and yogurt dip and squeezes into a table that needs to be pulled two feet from the wall to accommodate him.

Coltrane, as Sgt. Godley, restrains Inspector Fred Abberline (Johnny Depp), in From Hell.

Did we mentioned that he's a pretty big guy?

Cotrane, a Scotsman, will be hard to miss in the coming months, for reasons entirely unrelated to his size. H's currently in theaters playing Sergeant Godley, Johnny Depp's skeptical sidekick, in From Hell, and will next be seen as -- surprise -- the giant Hagrid in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. So how, at 51, did this longtime comedian and cultish actor suddenly achieve such Hollywood stature?

"The truth is, nothing very dramatic happened," laughs Coltrane. "I mean, I'm obviously not one of those people who's so beautiful women take their clothes off when I walk into the room. I didn't become a star overnight."

With more than 60 television and film credits since 1980, Coltrane has, indeed, walked a long road to stardom. A product of the Glasgow School of Art, where he majored in drawing, painting, and film, he began his career in sketch comedy, tasting his first success with The Comic Strip Presents..., a sort of across-the-pond SNL.

(A conversation with Coltrane is still an uproarious experience, marked by flying hands, pitch-perfect Valley Girl and De Niro impressions, and genial self-deprecation.)

But his full transition to drama didn't come until 1993, when he was cast as hard-drinking criminal psychologist Eddie Fitzgerald in the BBC series Cracker -- a role that won him consecutive BAFTA TV awards (Britain's Emmy equivalent) and made him a household name in England. "It showed a lot of people who thought I was a wank comic what I could do."

The show gained a small but devoted Stateside following (even inspiring a short-lived U.S. version). That, combined with Coltrane's turn as a Russian mobster in the 1995 007 flick GoldenEye, put him in the sights of major Hollywood casting directors.

"We originally thought of Bob Hoskins," From Hell codirector Allen Hughes says of the Godley role. "Then we saw Cracker and went, 'Wow, man, this guy is just the s---!' He has this great spirit, which is exactly the element we needed."

Coltrane currently makes his home in the bucolic Scottish countryside with his wife, Rhona, a sculptor, and their 8-year-old son and 3-year-old daughter. But he won't be there long: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, the second adaptation in the series, starts shooting in London in November.

"It's like going back to school. You know, autumn! Time for Harry Potter!" he says of playing Hagrid the groundskeeper, one of Harry's closest friends and a key character in all of the J.K. Rowling books.

"But, I tell ya, my kids love it. I thought I was the coolest dad in the world when I got to be in a Bond film, but Harry Potter, too? Well, I think I qualify for a medal for exceptional parenting or something, don't you?" Indeed. A great big one.

The 26 October 2001 issue of Entertainment Weekly also had a cover story, the "Power List" of people in entertainment.

Author J.K. Rowling was #15. Her notation read:

Author. Age: 36.
Credits: Chris Columbus' Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone the first of her boy wizard books, is the movie event of 2001, and her four Potter novels to date still sit near the top of any bestsellers list. She could have done almost nothing all year and remained publishing's biggest power...
Debits: ... which is exactly what she did, putting fans through their longest wait ever (Potter book 5 won't hit until next year). Yes, she did publish two companion books for charity, making millions for Comic Relief U.K., but somehow it's not the same.

Arthur A. Levine, head of a division at Scholastic, Inc., bearing his own name, and the man who brought Harry to the USA, was #78. His notation read:

Vice president and editorial director, Arthur A. Levine Books/Scholastic. Age: 39
Credits: Quality children's lit editor with his finger on the pulse of the 12-and-under set. Hit the commercial big time with the Harry Potter (U.S. rights for the first book purchased for a mere $100,000), catapulting the lower-profile Scholastic to the No. 4 slot in revenues, behind behemoths HarperCollins and Penguin Putnam. Continues to aim high, publishing first children's book by Irish novelist Roddy Doyle [Webmaster: Also one of Rowling's favorite writers.]
Debits: How high can he fly with no new Potter until next year?

And the three Sorcerer's Stone kiddie leads were inserted at the end at # "101.5." Their notation read:

The Potter Kids: Emma Watson, Rupert Grint, Daniel Radcliffe. Ages: 11/13/12.
Credits: The plucked-from-near-obscurity Brits are wizard-in-training Harry and pals Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger. Collectively they're the stars of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone -- the biggest sure-thing phenomenon since The Phantom Menace -- and potentially six more features, should Warner Bros. turn all of J.K. Rowling's novels into movies (talk about job security).
Debits: This whole Harry Potter thing? It'll follow you the rest of your lives.