ROBBIE Coltrane has admitted that he’s glad Harry Potter fans don’t recognise him without his large beard.
The Scots actor says that he very rarely gets recognised because of the costume he wears for the role of Rubeus Hagrid in the hit films.
And he says that he appreciates the anonymity especially as other actors in the film get booed.
He recently told a TV magazine:
“Because I’m bearded up as Hagrid, kids generally don’t recognise me.
“I very much appreciate that anonymity – especially when you see what happens to Alan Rickman, who plays Snape. He gets kids hissing at him in airports!”
But the 61-year-old confessed: “When when kids do recognise me, they go all doe-eyed, which is great.”
The star also admitted that fans would never come up to him when he starred in Cracker.
He said:
“Quite the opposite – people would move away from me in supermarkets. They thought I was about to take them into the frozen fish section and psychoanalyse them. “
Coltrane is making a rare TV appearance in Jack Dee’s BBC2 sitcom Lead Balloon which will air on Tuesday night.
The actor will also return to the big screen next month as the final Harry Potter Film, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2, opens in cinemas.
Coltrane added that he thinks the books have been such a success because JK Rowling has not made them
“fashionable or trendy”.
He said: “No-one is playing on the Wii or listening to an iPod. The stories are about friendship and trying to be true to yourself and be popular – the stuff we all go through as teenagers. “
