Jude Law and Johnny Depp are two of the biggest names attached to Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, but they somehow never crossed paths on set.
“I don’t actually have any scenes with Johnny,” Law, 45, told Entertainment Weekly in an interview published on Tuesday, July 17. “This is only Part 2 of a longer story. I’ve always admired him from afar, but we don’t know each other, and I’ve not yet met him on this.”
The two-time Oscar winner teased that his character, Albus Dumbledore, and Depp’s Gellert Grindelwald are not exactly the best of friends in the script, so he was fine with not seeing the Hollywood Vampires guitarist during production of the Harry Potter prequel.
“In many ways that suits the relationship as it’s been many years since they’ve seen each other,” Law said of the two wizards. “So there’s complexity in that that’s fun to mine. Again, the past will reveal itself.”
The Talented Mr. Ripley star also spoke about how he prepared to take on the role of a young Dumbledore. “I knew the books and the Harry Potter films pretty well, my children grew up with them so I grew up as an accompanying adult,” he said, referencing his five kids: Rafferty, 21, Iris, 17, Rudy, 15, Sophia, 8, and Ada, 3.
“I’d seen and enjoyed the first [Fantastic Beasts] film. Then I had the good fortune and opportunity to sit with J.K. Rowling shortly after we started work on it,” he continued. “She gave me a very good sense of Albus’ life journey and who he was and what was happening in his head and his heart and his world for this particular story.”
Rowling, 52, wrote the screenplay for the both installments so far in the Fantastic Beasts franchise. She made headlines in December when she defended the decision to keep Depp, 55, in the series after his ex-wife Amber Heard accused him of abuse, which he has denied. The author wrote on her website that she and the filmmakers were “not only comfortable sticking with our original casting, but genuinely happy to have Johnny playing a major character in the movies.”
Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald hits theaters on Friday, November 16.
