The Associated Press has released their interview with Michael Gambon where he discusses his role as Professor Albus Dumbledore in the Harry Potter films. Echoing many of his comments heard earlier from the LA Times, this acclaimed and versatile actor remarks on playing an iconic figure like the beloved Hogwarts Headmaster:
He established himself on the stage with widely hailed performances
of Shakespeare ("Othello," "Macbeth," "King Lear") and Harold Pinter
("Betrayal," "The Caretaker"). He was given the nickname "The Great
Gambon," praised for the physicality, nuance and unpredictability of
his performances. "I've played quite a lot of crooks and killers,
and that's quite interesting," says Gambon. "Then Dumbledore is the
complete opposite, isn't he? He's a nice old man."...Gambon says, it's common for a young child to anxiously spy him while sipping coffee at a cafe. "It's
very odd," Gambon said in an interview shortly after the film's crazed
London premiere. "I hadn't realized before just how powerful these
things are. I just do the job and go home and you forget it" — adding a
snap of his finger...This[being part of the Harry Potter series] will stick out as being a happy memory, being with a thing for so
long and the worldwide love of it," says Gambon. "You never forget
that."
I don’t know…It’s just that I’ll always have Richard Harris in my mind, he was great in the first two films and I suppose his figure has just stuck in my head…. although I suppose it’s more complicated than that…
I, too, thought that this performance was an improvement. I did not think his portrayal of a harsher Dumbledore held true to the books. In my mind’s eye, I still invision Richard Harris’ Dumbledore. I truely wish that he could have finished the movies. And for what it’s worth, I like the pony holder in his beard – it keeps the beard neat, no fly-a-ways!
Like Noble Birth Descending said, what is missing from Gambon’s Dumbledore is the subtle, witty humour and manner of speech, as exemplified in the quotation by Noble Birth Descending, “let us step out into the night and pursue that flightly temptress, adventure.” But Gambon himself is not to blame for that, it’s the scriptwriters who have ripped the movie-Dumbledore of his characteristic way of speaking.
I absolutely adore the book-Dumbledore’s manner of speech! But, unfortunately, the scriptwriters have taken that away and replaced it with words like “assassin” (Dumbledore would not use such a word!) and crude, hurried lines of explaining why Dumbledore cuts his hand in the ante-chamber to The Cave, instead of keeping the wonderfully humorous and so very Dumbledore-ish “Oh, surely not. How crude” when he discovers the blood sacrifice in the book. And what’s with Dumbledore’s sudden interest in Harry’s love life? That’s not Gambon’s fault either of course, he definitely tries to make the best of the lines he’s given.
All in all, I’m very happy with Gambon’s portrayal of Dumbledore in HBP. He is very intense, more intense than the book-Dumbledore, and sometimes a bit too hasty for my liking, but I sincerely doubt that can be attributed to Gambon himself, but rather to Yates and the scriptwriters. The “Severus….please” in the Astronomy Tower was quite perfect. And I liked how they tried to convey Dumbledore’s increasing weakness with making him stumble to sit on the stairs after seeing Slughorn’s true memory.
This time, he finally got it right (IMO). This is the Dumbledore I’ve been waiting for.
Truth be told, as great as an actor as Richard Harris was, If he had lived this long, I don’t think he would have been able to handle the physicality of this role.
"VOLDEMORT!" Harry bellowed, and Hagrid was so shocked, he stopped crying. "I've met him and I'm calling him by his name. Please cheer up, Hagrid, we saved the Stone, it's gone, he can't use it. Have a Chocolate Frog, I've got loads...."
he was more like Dumbledore in this film, not as angry and harsh as in GoF. More the gentle old man Dumbledore really was.