Harry Potter and the Poltergeist of Mischievous Giggles

Harry Potter is one of the biggest British films of all time, but one star it seems was just too big for the franchise. There’s no denying that Peeves the Poltergeist is an integral part of the Harry Potter books, but he doesn’t make any appearances in the movies at all, and here’s why.

If you haven’t heard of Rik Mayall then you’ve either been hiding under a rock, or you don’t know much about British culture. Mayall was an English comedian, actor writer who along with Ade Edmonson brought us the alternative comedy of Bottom and The Young Ones. Over the years he’s produced some of the funniest television to come out of the UK and seemed the perfect choice to play mischievous Peeves the Poltergeist.

Mayall is a British treasure, and to many of his fans it seems that there had to be a place for him in the Harry Potter universe, but he never appeared in the films and that’s because he played Peeves the Poltergeist but had all his scenes cut! This fact was virtually unknown until 2014 when Rik Mayall died suddenly and cut scenes from an interview were unearthed.

Here’s the interview and Mayall’s take on his Harry Potter experience (be warned, he’s quite sweary).

Later, Devon Murray who played Seamus Finnigan in the series explained in an interview that the late Rik Mayall was so funny in the role, nobody could keep a straight face, holding up filming and making it fairly impossible to continue. Cosmopolitian quoted Murray as saying “And while we were filming with the late Rik Mayall, he was absolutely hilarious. I think that’s why he got cut out the movie – because nobody, the cast or crew, could keep a straight face around him. It just didn’t work when there are so many kids there trying to look scared.” Oliver Phelps who played George Weasley also weighed in on the subject adding “I was sitting next to Rik Mayall in a read through, and I remember he was cast to play Peeves. I was a really big The Young Ones fan, so I thought that was awesome. He was really cool, which put me at ease at the time.”

So there we have it, Rik Mayall was too funny to play Peeves.

This does of course mean that somewhere out there are the deleted scenes of Rik Mayall playing Peeves. I can confirm today that they have never been released, but we can hope for the future!