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Art & Creativity Quote by Warwick Davis

"But things such as 'Harry Potter', all I can do is shape my character, seek the director's approval on that, and basically take it from there. Professor Flitwick in 'Harry Potter', I kind of defined how I saw him from reading the book, and luckily that matched up with the director's vision"

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Acting in a mega-franchise is less auteur fantasy than negotiated settlement, and Warwick Davis lays that out with disarming clarity. The line is modest on the surface - do your homework, build a character, get the director to sign off - but the subtext is about power: in a machine as tightly branded as Harry Potter, the actor's creative freedom exists inside a narrow corridor. Davis isn't complaining; he's mapping the terrain. "All I can do" is both professional humility and a quiet boundary marker, the kind working actors learn to articulate when every choice could ricochet through continuity departments, fan expectation, and studio guardianship.

What's sharp here is how he positions authorship. He doesn't claim to "create" Flitwick so much as "shape" him from the source text, then present that interpretation for approval. The verb choice matters: shaping implies craft, not ownership. It acknowledges that character is a product with multiple stakeholders - the book, the director, the production's tone - and the actor is one instrument in the orchestra.

The luck he cites isn't luck at all; it's alignment. Davis describes the real audition happening after casting: can your internal reading of a beloved character dovetail with the director's? It's an actor speaking from inside the cultural moment when adaptations became communal property, policed by fidelity. His satisfaction comes not from control, but from synchronization: the rare case where personal imagination matches the franchise's official face.

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TopicMovie
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APA Style (7th ed.)
Davis, Warwick. (2026, January 16). But things such as 'Harry Potter', all I can do is shape my character, seek the director's approval on that, and basically take it from there. Professor Flitwick in 'Harry Potter', I kind of defined how I saw him from reading the book, and luckily that matched up with the director's vision. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/but-things-such-as-harry-potter-all-i-can-do-is-107883/

Chicago Style
Davis, Warwick. "But things such as 'Harry Potter', all I can do is shape my character, seek the director's approval on that, and basically take it from there. Professor Flitwick in 'Harry Potter', I kind of defined how I saw him from reading the book, and luckily that matched up with the director's vision." FixQuotes. January 16, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/but-things-such-as-harry-potter-all-i-can-do-is-107883/.

MLA Style (9th ed.)
"But things such as 'Harry Potter', all I can do is shape my character, seek the director's approval on that, and basically take it from there. Professor Flitwick in 'Harry Potter', I kind of defined how I saw him from reading the book, and luckily that matched up with the director's vision." FixQuotes, 16 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/but-things-such-as-harry-potter-all-i-can-do-is-107883/. Accessed 12 Feb. 2026.

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About the Author

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Warwick Davis (born February 3, 1970) is a Actor from England.

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