Harry Potter star calms rumors of feud between Emma Watson and J.K. Rowling

By this point, J.K. Rowling is known for two things: writing one of the most successful fantasy series of the last century, and airing out her transphobic views in public. The latter has led to a fair amount of consternation in the fan base and among the actors who starred in the Harry Potter film series, all three of the principles — Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint and Emma Watson — have expressed disagreement with her views, although they haven’t disparaged Rowling herself.

But this is the internet; if there is no feud between famous people for us to gawk at, we will create one. An opportunity presented itself at last month’s BAFTA awards, when Rebel Wilson playfully introduced Watson as “a witch,” referring to her role as Hermione Granger. Watson said that was there “for all of the witches,” which sounds like it’s a reference to Rowling’s trans-exclusionary comments, since she’s only for the cisgender witches. Then again, it’s not like that’s confirmed; maybe it was just an errant comment.

But again, an errant comment is enough for us. Per Games Radar, Harry Potter star Evanna Lynch (Luna Lovegood) address the “feud” on GB News, where she insisted that there is nothing but love and respect between Watson and Rowling. That apparently goes for the whole cast, even if many of them don’t support Rowling’s views. Meanwhile, Miriam Margolyes — who played Professor Sprout in the Harry Potter movies — told Radio Times that she’d be willing to arbitrate between Rowling and Watson “if anybody asked me.”

Really, who knows what any of these people are thinking? It is true that Rowling has kept a relatively low profile since the firestorm around her really heated up back in 2020, possibly on the advice of her PR people. She also didn’t appear in the Harry Potter reunion special on HBO Max.

Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore having a rough time at the box office

As for what Rowling is actually writing these days, her latest movie — Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore — is out in theaters now. The third in a planned series of five movies, each Fantastic Beasts film has performed worse than the one before it, and this one is no exception; the box office take dropped 67% from the weekend prior.

That said, even if The Secrets of Dumbledore is on track to be the worst-performing movie in the series so far, it’s still close to breaking the $300 million mark (with a budget of $200 million). But that said, it’s performing so much worse than The Crimes of Grindelwald that you wonder if Warner Bros. may not just retroactively make this a trilogy and be done with it, particularly with star Ezra Miller running around causing all kinds of fracas.

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