Mr. (Your holiest?) Young Pope himself Jude Law has been tapped to play a younger version of Harry Potter’s wizard headmaster Dumbledore in the Fantastic Beasts sequel, but Conan O’Brien has offered a peek at some other options producers could have gone with. We really missed out on some bold choices, gang.
Using the time-honored failed auditions comedic device, Conan showcased some other contenders to take on the mighty beard in the man’s younger days. A wave of familiar faces (that earned much hooting and hollering from Conan’s Comic-Con crowd) popped by to their hand at “Teen Dumbledore” and provided their own methods on how to tackle the character. Aubrey Plaza decided to approach Teen Dumbledore like Marcia Gay Harden in Pollock, Silicon Valley star Thomas Middleditch figured a hip youth-oriented brand of Dumbledore was the way to go and Tatiana Maslany’s on-set help isn’t playing round.
“What is with these wands? What are these, like the cellphones of the wizarding world? You got to call down a spell?” offered Patton Oswalt’s spin on Dumbledore. “Hang on! I can’t cast a Patronus, I’ve only got two bars.”
Jude Law may be the young Dumbledore of today, but J.K. Rowling has options if she needs to ring up with an alternate suggestion. It’s funny, ridiculous and has both Nick Offerman AND Frankie Muniz going for the same role which is an exciting place for a casting director to be in.
