As Harry Potter duo Julie Walters and Rupert Grint are lending their onscreen magic to new movie, Driving Lessons, we thought we better haul them in for a chat and check nothing fishy is going on...

Is it good to be reunited? You must be seeing a lot of each other.

Julie: Yes, we're getting engaged – there's an exclusive. You heard it here first!

Did you know you were both involved with the film when you accepted the roles? And was it nice having someone familiar on set?

Rupert: I had heard rumours. It appealed as it was quite scary going on to a new set because I've been used to the same crew and people for six years. It's the first thing I've done really, since Harry Potter, so it was good to see a friendly face.

Did you enjoy playing Evie? She's a very eccentric character.

Julie: Oh yes, it was great fun, edible really. I love the swearing. It's very liberating as she's very liberated. It fabulous playing an actor, I'm not going through her actor's hell so it's quite nice to play it and look at it and laugh at it.

Do you have stage fright like she does?

Everyone does. I don't know an actor, especially my age, who hasn't been through that. It's very common.

What do you prefer, stage, film or TV?

Stage, that's the most exciting but film is lovely – it's like a family

Rupert, this is a much smaller and intimate film than the Harry Potter films, was that part of the appeal?

Rupert: Definitely, it was just so different. It was a much lower budget, smaller crew no blue screen or special effects or creatures. It was nice doing another a new role. As much as I love playing Ron, it was good doing something different.

The focus is a lot more on you in this film then in Harry Potter, what was that like?

It's a much bigger part and makes it scarier because there's more responsibility. It was good experience and I want to do more.

Will we see more of you after the Harry Potter films?

I definitely want to follow through the Harry Potter films and do the next two films because I enjoy doing them. Now I've finished school, I've got nothing else to do and I definitely want to continue acting.

Julie, why aren't you are dame yet?

What in a panto? How could I answer that – it's unanswerable. I'm not bothered about that kind of thing. I just love acting - and I'm too young!

You're always playing older characters though?

I always have, since I was in my early twenties. It appeals – It's Victoria Wood's fault, that's where it started. I loved playing old women and she wrote loads of old woman parts for me.

Why do you like it so much?

Because they're interesting and my grandmother lived with us for a very long time when I was a child – that's probably why. The incontinence, the madness, it's there. Old people tend to be slightly more eccentric, they can behave the way they want. You reach a certain age and give yourself permission to say what you think and people allow it.

How's filming for Harry Potter going? Was it good to be back on set?

Rupert: It's going really well. It's nearly finished, we've only got a couple of months left. We've got a new director this time David Jakes and he's really wicked.

And, what are you working on next?

Julie: I'm in Becoming Jane about Jane Austin, that's coming out next year, I'm playing her mother. It's really interesting, she was an extraordinary character. Ann Hathaway is Jane and she's actually amazing, a really, really good actress.

And, I've got a novel coming out. It's called Maggie Tree and it's about a couple of actresses who go to New York to visit an actress who happens to be working there and one of them is in the throes of a breakdown. She disappears and is picked up by a man in a bar and it's about what happens to them and his agenda and what happens to the others. It's character lead.

Is it scary, after being so successful as an actress, doing something new?

A bit, I find it very exposing in a strange way it's very intimate. Creating the characters was like acting, making up their lives – it was like playing God.

[ITV, 11 Sep 2006 || Original article found here]