Quote from Oladosun Joshua Segun on September 22, 2025, 7:26 PM

It was Emma Watson's opinion that she should keep her broomstick away from Hollywood. The Harry Potter actress does, in fact, have a positive memory of her career, but she also discussed her reasons for leaving acting to pursue her doctorate, acknowledging that some aspects of the job ultimately detracted from the experience.

"In some ways, I really won the lottery [with acting], and what happened to me is so unusual," in an interview that was released on September 21, Emma tells Hollywood Authentic. "But a bigger component than the actual job itself is the promotion and selling of that piece of work, this piece of art. The balance of that can get quite thrown off."

"I think I'll be honest and straightforward, and say: I do not miss selling things," she went on. "I found that to be quite soul-destroying. But I do very much miss using my skill set, and I very much miss the art. I just found I got to do so little of the bit that I actually enjoyed."

The 35-year-old, who debuted as an actress at the age of 11 in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone in 1999, found being in front of the camera to be "so freeing."

"The moment you get on a film set, you don't get very long for rehearsal," she clarified. "But the moment you get to talk through a scene—or I got to prepare and think about how I wanted to do something—and then the minute the camera rolls and getting to just completely forget about everything else in the world other than that one moment—it's such an intense form of meditation. Because you just cannot be anywhere else."

Emma said that Little Women was her final project in 2019. "I miss that profoundly."

But she stressed, "I don't miss the pressure. I forgot it was a lot of pressure."

"I did a small thing for a play, just with my friends," she went on. "I was like, 'Bloody hell, this is stressful!' And that wasn't even for a real public audience or anything. I don't miss that."

Even if Emma would think about doing something behind the camera, the University of Oxford student is currently concentrating on her loved ones, who are the things that truly mean to her.

"The most important thing, really—or the foundation of your life—is your home and friends and family," an alumnus of Perks of Being a Wallflower. "I think I worked so hard for so long that my life sort of bottomed out. The bottom fell out of the piece, which was actually me and my life."

"So, I needed to go and do some construction work," she pointed out. "Some good foundations for anything else to grow from."

Emma's use of "Evanesco" during her acting career is not unique.