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Katie Leung is opening up about the racist backlash and hateful comments that came in response to her Harry Potter casting.
The 37-year-old Scottish actress played Cho Chang in five of the Harry Potter films, making her big screen debut in the series in 2005’s Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, where she captured Daniel Radcliffe’s eye romantically but was instead pursuing Cedric Diggory (Robert Pattinson).
Leung has previously shared how, prior to even beginning filming (and while she was still a teenager and in school), news of her role was leaked — and the harassment began.
Speaking to The Guardian in a new interview, the actress — who will soon take on the role of Lady Araminta Gun in Bridgerton season 4 — was asked how she dealt with the sudden fame that came with her role in the Harry Potter franchise.
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“I don’t think I did,” she told the outlet. “It was overwhelming from the get-go. Being in the spotlight from that age, when you’re already insecure, was difficult, to say the least.”
And while she added that she “was having a lot of fun” while filming, she acknowledged that stumbling upon the online harassment was not good for her mental health.
“At that age, you’re curious,” she said. “I remember being very curious about what people were saying about me, and I was Googling myself. Nobody could have stopped me, because I was old enough to make up my own mind.”
Asked how she dealt with the bullying, Leung told The Guardian, “I didn’t.”
“I think it just sat with me, and it affected me in ways like, ‘Oh yeah, I made that decision because people were saying this about me.’ It probably made me less outgoing. I was very self-aware of what was coming out of my mouth.”
Leung earlier recounted the bullying she faced following her Harry Potter casting in a 2021 episode of the Chinese Chippy Girl podcast, saying that it all began after someone took a “secret photo” of her that wound up in newspapers.
After that, the actress said, she began receiving hateful and negative messages.
“I was like, Googling myself at one point and I was on this website, which was kind of dedicated to the Harry Potter fandom, and I remember reading all the comments. It was a lot of racist s—,” she said.
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“And then somebody had actually created a website, a hate site — it was like, if you disagree with this casting, then click on this button and then it would just be like a count of how many people disagreed with the casting and you would just see a number,” Leung continued. “I know, it’s awful. It’s so awful.”
The actress will soon portray the “twice married and twice widowed” Lady Araminta Gun, whose two daughters Rosamund Li (Michelle Mao) and Posy Li (Isabella Wei) are “debuting on the marriage mart this season,” on Bridgerton season 4, which premieres January 29.
