by Daniel Radcliffe has revealed that he was set to make his directional debut with David Holmes: The Boy Who Lived. The documentary covers the story of Radcliffe’s Harry Potter stunt double, who was paralyzed during an accident on set.
At the documentary’s London premiere, Radcliffe called in from New York City, where he’s currently starring in the Broadway revival of Merrily We Roll Along. The actor explained how he initially planned to direct the documentary in a Q&A with director Dan Hartley, but things didn’t go as he envisaged.
“I had always wanted to do something about Dave because I wanted to share him with the world for the person that he is,” Radcliffe said. “And Dave’s natural humility meant that he was kind of unsure about that for a while — he wanted to make something broader about stunts in general.”
“But eventually, I sort of convinced him that he should be front and centre of it,” he continued. “And we shot some stuff because, for some reason, I thought — having never done anything like this before — that I would know how to direct a documentary. Turns out, I didn’t. At all.”
The Harry Potter actor explained that when he showed initial shots to Hartley, the former stunt double “very kindly went, ‘If you want to make a documentary that, you know, looks good, you should probably start again.’ So we did, and he just absolutely hit the nail on the head and made the film that you see in front of you.”
Radcliffe ultimately took on executive producer duties on the movie. The documentary focuses mainly on Holmes’ recovery following a death-defying spinal cord injury during pre-production rehearsals for Deathly Hallows Part 1.
David Holmes: The Boy Who Lived is now available to stream on HBO and will premiere in the UK on Sky Documentaries and NOW on November 18th.
