Harry Potter star John Lithgow thinks JK Rowling’s trans views have been ‘twisted’
John Lithgow and JK Rowling (Getty Images)
Actor John Lithgow has said that he thinks JK Rowling’s views on trans people have been “twisted and misrepresented”.
Lithgow, who is playing Albus Dumbledore in HBO’s upcoming Harry Potter series, made the comments during an interview with The New Yorker‘s Radio Hour podcast on 27 March.
“The whole subject of Rowling’s imputed prejudice, it came up after everything was already underway. I’d already said yes […] I was urged to walk away, and I was not about to do that,” Lithgow said.
READ MORE: John Lithgow says JK Rowling’s trans views ‘inexplicable’ but defends Harry Potter role
“The reasons to do it were much, much stronger than the reasons to protest against what Rowling has done and said. I do disagree with much of it, much of it I think has been twisted and misrepresented, and she has doubled down on it at her own cost.”
Lithgow did not specify which of Rowling’s actions he disagreed with but added he was “surprised” and “disappointed” by her delivery on social media. However, he did go on to say that at least one of the “reasons to do it” was job security.
“There was everything attractive about the job, and job security into my late years. You don’t ignore those issues,” he said.
Many fans of Lithgow were disappointed when it was announced that the actor was attached to the Harry Potter reboot in February last year, especially considering he has been involved in trans projects in the past.
The Third Rock from the Sun actor himself played a stereotype-smashing trans character, Roberta Muldoon, in The World According to Garp in 1982, and last year starred in Jimpa, a film about a man with a non-binary grandchild, opposite Olivia Colman.
Lithgow previously shared that he considered quitting the project in a 17 March interview with The New York Times. He acknowledged that some criticism, including from members of the LGBTQ+ community, had been difficult.
He said he now expects in “every interview I will ever do for the rest of my life this will come up”.
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