Just wizard! Hagrid’s girl follows in his (rather big) footsteps...
HER father plays the world’s most famous jovial giant. Yet following in the large footsteps of Robbie Coltrane is proving no huge feat for his daughter.
Alice McMillan, 21, is being tipped for the top by film industry insiders thanks to a role in award-winning film The Souvenir, with fellow Scot Tilda Swinton.
The Martin Scorsese-produced movie – which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January and took the World Cinema Dramatic Grand Jury Prize – is about a dark love affair between a young film student and an older man.
The film, which has been hailed ‘exceptional’, promises to springboard Alice’s career.
Its director, Joanna Hogg, has previously discovered such talent as Tom Hiddleston, who appeared in her debut film, Unrelated, in 2007.
Given her father’s stardom as Hagrid in the Harry Potter movies, as well as in TV shows such as Cracker and Tutti Frutti, Alice was raised in a surprisingly down-toearth fashion.
Her upbringing in a Dunbartonshire farmhouse with sculptor mother Rhona Gemmell, brother Spencer McMillan and her father – born Anthony McMillan before he changed his name in honour of jazz musician John Coltrane – was a far cry from the glitz of Hollywood.
But she soon started to feel the pull of acting, perhaps sparked by her enrolment at Glasgow Clyde College, whose alumni include fellow creatives such as Joe McFadden, Iain De Caestecker, and Richard Rankin, from TV show Outlander.
She made her screen debut on Outlander in 2014 and later appeared in the short film Dark Water, which made the official selection for the Palm Springs International Shortfest in 2016.
The aspiring actress is now signed to prestigious agency Hamilton Hoddell, which counts Robert Carlyle, Rupert Grint, Mr Hiddleston, Anjelica Huston, Hugh Lawrie and Miss Swinton among its stars.
Alice’s promising future has come as no surprise to those who knew her growing up.
A lecturer at Glasgow Clyde College last night said he was delighted to watch Alice’s career blossom.
David Lee-Michael, senior lecturer in acting and performance at the college, said: ‘Alice was an exemplary student who consistently demonstrated an enthusiasm for the work and a maturity in her creativity that belied her years. ‘She was a pleasure to work with and we are delighted that she is doing so
well.’