‘Harry Potter’ TV series star Nick Frost says his Hagrid will be different from Robbie Coltrane

Harry Potter TV series star Nick Frost hopes to enchant viewers with a fresh take on beloved character Rubeus Hagrid in HBO’s upcoming episodic adaptation of the beloved fantasy book series.

Frost opened up about the difficult task of forming a unique take on Hagrid — a half-giant who serves as groundskeeper at the magical school Hogwarts — after the late actor Robbie Coltrane played the part across eight successful Harry Potter films.

“You get cast because you’re going to bring something to that,” Frost told Collider of his approach to the character. “While I’m really aware of what went before me in terms of Robbie’s amazing performance, I’m never going to try and be Robbie. I’m going to try and do something, not ‘different,’ I think you have to be respectful to the subject matter, but within that, there’s scope for minutia.”

Frost further shared insight into the details he has picked up on regarding the character, telling the publication he “always read Hagrid as he’s like a lovely, lost, violent, funny, warm child,” overseeing Hogwarts’ magical creatures.

“I think the beauty of being able to do a book a season means I get to explore that a lot more, and I can’t wait. He’s funny! I want it to be funny and cheeky and scared and protective and childlike. That’s what I’m planning on doing,” he said of the show’s format, which he said would take “ten or eleven months” to film a single season.

“I’m just so excited to get going. I’ve gone in to do head sculpts and have your hand stand and stuff, and they say, ‘Oh, have a look at this.’ And you’re like, ‘Wow. That’s the coolest thing,” the 53-year-old continued. “I love films. I’ve loved cinema my whole life, so to be part of that universe now and that they’re showing me, like, a dancing mushroom, it’s like, ‘That is so cool!’”

Frost is among a growing cast of performers set to breathe new life into the Harry Potter franchise when the TV project debuts, with John Lithgow portraying Hogwarts head Albus Dumbledore, Janet McTeer as Minerva McGonagall, and Paapa Essiedu as Severus Snape, among others.

As for the titular boy wizard and his steadfast friends Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, the production has cast newcomers Dominic McLaughlin, Alastair Stout, and Arabella Stanton, respectively.

Controversial Harry Potter book author J.K. Rowling will also serve as a producer on the show, though she’s said in recent weeks that she won’t interfere with the casting of actors who have voiced support for the trans community as she continues to speak out on transgender issues.

After Essiedu joined other stars in signing an open letter of solidarity with the trans community after the U.K. Supreme Court ruled in April in favor of a Rowling-backed sentiment that defined womanhood by biological sex, Rowling confirmed on X that she doesn’t “have the power to sack an actor from the series,” and that she “wouldn’t exercise [that power] if I did.”

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“I don’t believe in taking away people’s jobs or livelihoods because they hold legally protected beliefs that differ from mine,” Rowling continued.

HBO’s Casey Bloys, the chairman and CEO of content at HBO and HBO Max, also addressed concerns that the new series would reflect Rowling’s views, telling The Town podcast, “Harry Potter is not being secretly infused with anything.”