Jason Isaacs Loves His Job

Posted on January 15, 2007

Jason Isaacs, who does such a fabulous job of portraying Lucius Malfoy in the Harry Potter films, told Cindy White of Sci Fi Wire that he is delighted that he will have more to do in the next Harry Potter film. He also shared how he begged J.K. Rowling to write his character some great lines in the last Harry Potter book.

Jason Isaacs, who plays Lucius Malfoy in the Harry Potter film franchise, told SCI FI Wire that he'll have a lot more to do in the upcoming fifth film, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, including (spoiler!) a wand-to-wand fight with Sirius Black (Gary Oldman). "I had virtually nothing to do in number four," Isaacs said in an interview at the Television Critics Association winter press tour in Pasadena, Calif., where he was promoting his upcoming BBC America miniseries The State Within. "In fact, when there's nothing to do like that, and they say, 'Do you want to come in for a couple of weeks?' you go, 'Well, I'm busy. Oh, God. All right.' Because the thought that somebody else might wear my wig is just too painful. But I have a little bit more to do in this."
*****
Isaacs said that the fifth film will include a harrowing showdown between his character and Harry's godfather, Sirius Black. "I get to have a wand battle with Gary Oldman, possibly my favorite actor in the universe," Isaacs said. "We get to play around like two 10-year-olds. And with kind of unlimited sci-fi imagination. It's fun. We just go, 'Well, how about if I ... .' And anything you finish that sentence with, they go, 'Yeah, OK. You can do that.' So it was magnificent."
The character does not appear in the sixth book, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, but Isaacs said he recently had an opportunity to meet author J.K. Rowling and appealed to her to include him in the seventh and final book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, due this year, possibly July. "I fell to my knees and begged," he joked. "It didn't do any good. I'm sure she doesn't need plot ideas from me. But I made my point. We'll see. Like everybody else, I'm holding my breath to July to see what's in there. I just want to bust out of prison, that's all. I don't want to stay in Azkaban most of my life."

Jason Isaacs does such a fantastic job as the delightfully evil Lucius Malfoy. We hope that Jo was at least somewhat sympathetic to his heartfelt plea for more screen time.