Daniel Radcliffe Biography

Daniel Radcliffe was born in West London, England to Alan George Radcliffe and Marcia Jeannine Gresham. His father is a literary agent and his mother worked as a casting agent for the BBC.

Radcliffe belonged to a working-class family; his father was a profuse protestant and his mother belonged to the Jewish faith. Both her parents had acted in small acting projects when they were children.

He was interested in acting professionally from the age of five but it was when he was finally ten years old that he got a role in the BBC adaptation of Dickens’ book ‘David Copperfield’.

Radcliffe attended two different private schools in England namely: Sussex House School and City of London School. He suffered from bullying in school after he started getting famous through his movies.

It became difficult for him to attend school owing to his busy acting schedule and he decided to not pursue college or university as he knew already that he wanted to write and act and that a college education would come in the way.

In 1999, when Radcliffe was 10 years old, he bagged the lead role in the BBC adaptation of Charles Dickens’ ‘David Copperfield’. He gave quite a few auditions for the role before he was finally signed on the project.

In 2000, Radcliffe got an offer to audition for the role in the movie ‘Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone’. His parents were insistent on not sending him for the auditions because the contract required him to do all seven movies in Los Angeles.

The writer of the series J.K. Rowling wanted Radcliffe to play the lead role in the movie. After several auditions, he was selected for the movie. Initially, he signed a two-movie contract and was promised that the shooting would take place in the UK.

The movie was finally released in 2001 and Radcliffe received a seven-figure salary for it. It was the highest-grossing movie of the year. His performance was critically acclaimed. In the same year, he did ‘The Tailor of Panama’.

In 2002, ‘Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets’ was released and Radcliffe received positive critical appreciation for it. The movie was the second highest-grossing film of the year worldwide.

In 2004, ‘Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban’ was released and got the highest acclaim out of all the movies from the series to date. It was the lowest-grossing movie out of the whole series.

In 2005, ‘Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire’ came out and it was directed by Mike Newell and produced by Warner Bros. Pictures. The movie was nominated for an Academy Award in the category of Best Art Direction.

In 2007, ‘Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix’. For this movie, he got many award nominations and he was awarded the National Movie Award for the category of Best Male Performance. He also made an appearance in ‘December Boys’.

In 2007, Radcliffe made a movie called ‘My Boy Jack’ along with the Hollywood star Carey Mulligan. It was a television movie that was broadcast on ITV. His acting in the movie got critical acclaim.

In 2009, ‘Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince’ was released as the second last movie of the series. He was nominated for the Best Male Performance and Global Superstar at the MTV Movie Awards.

In 2010, ‘Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1’ was released and the movie did well comparatively in the UK. The movie achieved average reviews from the media.

In 2011, the final movie out of the series ‘Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2’ was released. The movie got the biggest first-day opening and the biggest weekend. It is considered to be the 4th highest-grossing movie of all time.

In 2013, Radcliffe starred in ‘Kill Your Darlings’, a thriller drama which was directed by John Krokidas. He also did ‘The F Word’ and ‘Horns’ in the same year. He did ‘The Cripple of Inishmaan’ at the Noel Coward Theatre.

He next starred in films like ‘What If,’ ‘Trainwreck,’ ‘Victor Frankenstein,’ ‘Swiss Army Man,’ ‘Now You See Me 2,’ ‘Imperium,’ and ‘Lost in London.’ He portrayed ‘Yossi Ghinsberg’ in the 2017 Australian biographical survival drama film ‘Jungle.’ The film received mixed to positive reviews from critics. The following year, he was seen in the Jesper Ganslandt-directed crime action film ‘Beast of Burden.’ The film holds a 25% approval score on Rotten Tomatoes.

In 2019, he joined the cast of the anthology comedy series ‘Miracle Workers.’ The fourth season of the series premiered in 2023. He continued to star in films like ‘Playmobil: The Movie,’ ‘Guns Akimbo,’ ‘Escape from Pretoria,’ ‘The Lost City,’ and ‘Weird: The Al Yankovic Story.’

In 2023, he became a part of the recurring cast of the animated sitcom ‘Mulligan.’ The show received a mixed response from critics, earning a 50% approval score on Rotten Tomatoes.

He met Rossane Coker in 2007 while she was assisting on the sets of ‘Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince’. They soon started dating but later broke up in 2008.

In 2012, he began a relationship with actress Erin Darke. In 2023, the couple announced that they were expecting their first child together.

In 2008, Radcliffe told the media that he suffers from a neurological disorder developmental coordination disorder. He said that it gets so bad that he cannot even do day-to-day activities.