John Lithgow doesn’t seem to be losing any sleep over landing the iconic role of Professor Albus Dumbledore in the upcoming Harry Potter TV show.
“I don’t think it’s gonna be that hard a job,” Lithgow, 79, revealed on the Monday, March 24, episode of the “Smartless” podcast.
The two-time Academy Award nominee confirmed in February that he was joining HBO’s Wizarding World series, based on J.K. Rowling’s fantasy novels, as Hogwarts’ most powerful sorcerer.
Lithgow explained to “Smartless” hosts Jason Bateman, Sean Hayes and Will Arnett that his “deal” to join the Harry Potter show was finalized only “48 hours” before his interview on the podcast.
“In airports, two weeks ago, people had somehow gotten wind of this and they were stopping me in airports,” he explained.
Joking that he was “behind everybody” with his Potter reading, the actor said he was just “halfway through” the second book, 1998’s Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.
“The overall concept of this overall reboot of Harry Potter is that an entire season is devoted to a single novel,” he said.
Lithgow admitted it was so early in the Harry Potter development process that he “honestly [didn’t] know” all of the details about how much time he’d spend in the U.K. filming the show.
Comparing Harry Potter to his time playing late British Prime Minister Winston Churchill on The Crown, Lithow said, “I mean, I was over in England for eight months for The Crown and barely came back [to the U.S.]. I think I may have come back once or twice. I imagine that I can come back much more [on this].”
“You know, Dumbledore is — he’s kind of the nuclear weapon. He only goes on very, very occasionally,” he added. “And I think that — I don’t think it’s gonna be that hard a job, and we’ll just go back and forth.”
Lithgow previously admitted to ScreenRant in February the offer to play Dumbledore came as “a total surprise.”
“I just got the phone call up at the Sundance Film Festival for yet another film, and it was not an easy decision because it’s going to define me for the last chapter of my life, I’m afraid,” he said.
“Some wonderful people are turning their attention back to Harry Potter. That’s why it’s been such a hard decision,” he added. “I’ll be about 87 years old at the wrap party, but I’ve said yes.”
Dumbledore was originally played by Richard Harris in 2001’s Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone and 2002’s Chamber of Secrets, before he died in October 2002 following a battle with Hodgkin lymphoma.
Michael Gambon took over as the Hogwarts professor following Harris’s death, making his debut in 2004’s Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban and staying on for six films, in total. Toby Regbo played a younger version of the character for flashback scenes in both Deathly Hallows movies, while Jude Law portrayed a middle-aged Dumbledore in the Fantastic Beasts movies.
Lithgow, whose acting career dates back to 1972, received Oscar nominations for 1982’s The World According to Garp and 1983’s Terms of Endearment, and won three Emmy Awards for his leading role as bumbling alien invader Dick Solomon in NBC sitcom 3rd Rock from the Sun (He won three more Emmys in his career).
Lithgow memorably played the puritanical reverend Shaw Moore in Footloose on the big screen and serial killer Arthur Mitchell in TV thriller Dexter.
