LOS ANGELES?When Emma Watson recently strode into a room at Claridge?s Hotel in London, she provided stunning proof that she?s done with the ?Harry Potter? franchise?or at least the filming aspect of it.

Emma had her long Hermione hair dramatically cut short. To go with the very becoming do, she wore a short blue dress and stiletto shoe-boots. She looked drop-dead gorgeous.

?I needed a change,? declared the actress who debuted as the Muggle-born, bookish Hermione Granger in 2001. ?It has been 10 years. I needed to mark it in some way to say to myself, ?You?re entering a new phase of your life.? Mentally, you need to move on. So that?s what the haircut is about. It felt very liberating. I felt as though my hair had become Hermione?s hair. It wasn?t about me anymore. I needed to do something just to be completely Emma.?

Ma?s signature look

?This haircut has actually been my mother?s signature look since she was about 16 years old,? said the sophomore at Brown University. ?She?s always had short hair like this which I thought was really cool. I loved Mia Farrow, Jean Seberg and Audrey Hepburn.? We?ll feature our interview with Emma in tomorrow?s column.

For Emma, Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Tom Felton and some of the cast in one of the most successful franchises in cinema history, after the London premiere of ?Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1,? all that?s left is doing media promotions. That is, until July rolls in next year when the premiere and another round of press interviews take place for the ?Part 2.?

Daniel, in a separate interview at Claridge?s, announced that he?s already hard at work on his career after playing Harry Potter for a decade. ?I feel that I?ve landed on my feet in terms of my first post-?Potter? project,? said the actor.

That project is a drama-horror-thriller called ?The Woman in Black.? ?It is written by Jane Goldman, who wrote ?Stardust,? ?Kick Ass? and ?The Debt,?? Daniel told us enthusiastically. ?It will be coming out hopefully sometime next year. We?re filming at the moment. It?s directed by James Watkins, who?s a fantastic young director. I think he?s going to be like the next Chris Nolan or somebody like that. He?s got this amazing ambition for the films he wants to make but also a kind of European sensibility of how to shoot them. He?s really interesting. I?m very excited. The filming is going very well. We?re about five weeks into shooting. We?ll be finished in probably about another month.?

Then it?s off to Broadway for Daniel?s first foray into a stage musical, ?How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying,? which opens in February. ?I?ve always grown up listening to musicals,? said Daniel, who appeared in the drama, ?Equus,? in both West End and Broadway. ?A musical is something that I?m very excited to have a chance to explore. It requires a whole new set of skills. It?s going to be a real challenge but I?m looking forward to it, definitely.?

Daniel echoed what Emma described as a ?messy gradual ending? of filming the final two installments, both directed by David Yates. The three of them?Daniel, Emma and Rupert?shot one last scene together, after which the crew surprised them with a video montage of their decade on the ?HP? set and goodbyes from everyone. But they each had to return for a few re-shoots.

?When things ended, it was very sad,? Daniel said as he recalled that day. ?There were lots of crying. It was very emotional. The thing that people underestimate about that moment is that we had been filming for 18 months. That?s a long time so it was sad and bittersweet. We were exhausted and we were quite glad to finally finish.?

While ?Part 1? is mainly about the trio?s perilous journey away from Hogwarts to find and destroy the remaining Horcruxes (objects that hold pieces of Voldemort?s soul), ?Part 2,? which will be in 3D, is an epic war film.

Bloody fight

?We all knew the only way it could end is with a bloody great fight,? Daniel said. ?That is exactly what happens. The second part is going to be one of the most exhilarating because the action is nonstop. You?re flung at 200 miles an hour headfirst into a firestorm of action, basically from start to finish. It starts off with the closest a Harry Potter movie ever comes to being a heist movie. We?ve got our own version of ?Ocean?s Eleven? with the three of us?I should say, the four of us. After that, it pretty much is going straight into a war film?all the drama of a war film in terms of the relationships being lost, partnerships being severed and family bonds being broken.?

Asked what he will miss about playing J.K. Rowling?s beloved boy wizard, Daniel answered, ?The thing that I?ve taken for granted over the last 10 years was getting to play an action hero. You get to do stuff in that role that you don?t get to do anywhere else, like bursting out of the surface of water by a ring of fire on the sixth film, sliding down the roof in film four and the dragon chase sequence. I will miss the more exciting stunts and all that stuff because you don?t always get to do them as an actor.?

The miracle about the ?HP? trio is that somehow, despite spending their childhood and adolescence in the spotlight and earning huge salaries, they don?t appear headed for breakdowns or stints in rehab clinics. Daniel credited his parents and the franchise?s crew. He explained, ?I?ve got very good parents who never let me get above myself nor did the crew from ?Harry Potter.? It says a lot about my mom and dad and also the people I?ve been working with for the past 10 years that nobody actually allowed me to get too big for my boots.?

Iconic character

?I don?t think of myself as an icon,? Daniel added. ?That?s how I deal with it. It?s not a healthy way to think about yourself. That?s an abnormal amount of pressure to put yourself under. If other people see me that way, that?s their thing but I?m just somebody who has an amazing job, and who plays a very iconic character? I?m quite normal, really. I?m not to be exalted in any way. So how I deal with it is by laughing when it gets a bit weird, when people are shouting and screaming. You have to try and find those things as funny as you can since you can?t take it particularly seriously.?

He elaborated, ?One of the things I have to keep in mind is that it didn?t matter who got this part in terms of the hysteria and the mania. It?s not for me that Leicester Square was packed in pouring rain on a Thursday night (during the ?Part 1? premiere). It?s because of the character of Harry and because the franchise has become so iconic. That?s one of the thoughts that keep you grounded. It?s not actually about you so much as it is the franchise. I?m just somebody who got very lucky and has a lovely job.?

Of growing up with Emma and Rupert, Daniel said, ?There?s a kind of acknowledgment from all of us that we are the only three people in the world who know what it was like to go through that last decade. We have all gone from strength to strength not only in terms of acting. I did so much better in my education than I would have done otherwise. Obviously, Emma got straight ?A?s in everything. She has definitely been the most academic of the three of us.?

He stressed, ?It?s been a privilege to watch both Emma and Rupert grow up.? Laughing, he said, ?I hope they say the same about me.?

(To be continued tomorrow)

Email the columnist at rvnepales_5585@yahoo.com.