--- title: Harry Potter Almost Ruined Daniel Radcliffe's First Dates description: The fame of Harry Potter made dating tricky for Daniel Radcliffe. canonical: https://time.com/4387900/harry-potter-almost-ruined-daniel-radcliffes-first-dates/ author: Melissa Locker article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-06-29T17:54:48.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:33:54.932Z og:title: Harry Potter Almost Ruined Daniel Radcliffe's First Dates og:description: The fame of Harry Potter made dating tricky for Daniel Radcliffe. og:url: https://time.com/4387900/harry-potter-almost-ruined-daniel-radcliffes-first-dates/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3269452bf1b0704d/69889a0e524fc08649df8922/daniel-radcliffe.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3000 og:image:height: 1688 og:image:alt: Daniel Radcliffe og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Harry Potter Almost Ruined Daniel Radcliffe's First Dates twitter:description: The fame of Harry Potter made dating tricky for Daniel Radcliffe. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3269452bf1b0704d/69889a0e524fc08649df8922/daniel-radcliffe.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Harry Potter Almost Ruined Daniel Radcliffe's First Dates > Sponsored content. 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It curates the day's top headlines with TIME's reporting and analysis across politics, world affairs, business, health and culture. It is free to join at time.com/newsletters. #### How do I sign up for The Brief? The Brief is available free at time.com/newsletters, where readers can select it along with any of TIME's other six newsletters. There is no subscription required to receive it. #### Is The Brief free? Yes. The Brief is a free daily email newsletter from TIME. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes The Brief? The Brief is led by editor Richard Hall and draws on reporting from TIME's newsroom. Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically. by [Melissa Locker](https://time.com/author/melissa-locker/) ## Melissa Locker Jun 29, 2016 5:54 PM UTC  Daniel Radcliffe at AOL Studios on June 27, 2016 in New York. Daniel Radcliffe at AOL Studios on June 27, 2016 in New York. Daniel Zuchnik—WireImage/Getty Images by [Melissa Locker](https://time.com/author/melissa-locker/) ## Melissa Locker Jun 29, 2016 5:54 PM UTC Turns out being [Harry Potter](http://time.com/4110623/j-k-rowlings-biggest-harry-potter-revelations/?iid=sr-link2) doesn’t ensure a magical childhood. [Daniel Radcliffe](http://time.com/4137021/daniel-radcliffe-harry-potter-audition/?iid=sr-link1), who played the [most famous wizard](http://time.com/4380221/jk-rowling-fantastic-beasts-and-where-to-find-them/?iid=sr-link3) in the world for most of his young life, found it hard to leave the character behind. In a recent episode of Entertainment Weekly’s [The Jess Cagle Interview](http://www.ew.com/the-jess-cagle-interview), Radcliffe discussed his first ever “proper” date and his fervent hope that wearing a hat would be enough to deter any fans from mobbing him or making things more awkward than a first date already is. “I just went out with a cap on, and you have to hope that the person you’re dating is understanding and not made to feel awkward by someone coming up or anything like that, but you just do it,” Radcliffe [told](http://www.ew.com/article/2016/06/29/daniel-radcliffe-first-date) Cagle. “That was always the weird thing.” Despite his fame, Radcliffe didn’t feel like starring in [Harry Potter ](http://time.com/2965574/j-k-rowling-new-harry-potter-story/?iid=sr-link4)ruined his childhood. “All those first dates and first kisses, those rites of passage, I still had them, and they were actually generally really private,” he told Cagle. While he hasn’t [ruled out a return](http://time.com/4386952/harry-potter-daniel-radcliffe-role/?iid=sr-link4) to the world of Harry Potter, Radcliffe is still looking for more challenging roles to avoid being pigeonholed as a child star. Luckily his new movie, _Swiss Army Man_, which based on the trailers looks like _Weekend at Bernie’s_ meets _Castaway_ with Radcliffe playing a dead man, should help him shake off more of the [Harry Potter](http://time.com/4145643/harry-potter-prequel-fantastic-beasts-trailer/?iid=sr-link4) aura. Not sure how gaseous corpses fare in the dating world, though. \[H/T [EW](http://www.ew.com/article/2016/06/29/daniel-radcliffe-first-date)\] ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4387900/harry-potter-almost-ruined-daniel-radcliffes-first-dates/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4387900/harry-potter-almost-ruined-daniel-radcliffes-first-dates/"},"headline":"Harry Potter Almost Ruined Daniel Radcliffe's First Dates","datePublished":"2016-06-29T17:54:48.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:33:54.932Z","description":"Mischief (almost) managed","url":"https://time.com/4387900/harry-potter-almost-ruined-daniel-radcliffes-first-dates/","keywords":["Newsfeed","movies","Harry Potter","daniel radcliffe"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3269452bf1b0704d/69889a0e524fc08649df8922/daniel-radcliffe.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Melissa Locker","jobTitle":"","url":"https://time.com/author/melissa-locker/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3269452bf1b0704d/69889a0e524fc08649df8922/daniel-radcliffe.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Daniel Radcliffe","caption":"Daniel Radcliffe","creditText":"Daniel Zuchnik—WireImage/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4387900/harry-potter-almost-ruined-daniel-radcliffes-first-dates/","name":"Harry Potter Almost Ruined Daniel Radcliffe's First Dates"}}]}] ```