It seems Nicholas Hoult is collecting iconic villains like Infinity Stones. After playing Lex Luthor in James Gunn’s Superman, the actor has now been tapped to play Gilderoy Lockhart in the upcoming Harry Potter series. The character appears in the second Harry Potter book, which will be adapted in the show’s planned second season.
Nicholas Hoult is Professor Lockhart
Deadline reported that Nicholas, 36, has been finalised to play the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher in the second season of HBO’s massive Harry Potter series. The character was played by Kenneth Branagh in the film series, appearing in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002). In the novel, Gilderoy Lockhart is a notoriously vain, boastful and fame-obsessed wizard who is hired by Albus Dumbledore as Professor of Defence Against the Dark Arts at Hogwarts, the school of magic where Harry Potter and his friends study. Lockhart teaches the students in their second year. The novels (and the film adaptation) show him as a five-time winner of Witch Weekly’s Most Charming Smile Award. Lockhart authored many books on dark creatures and his supposed encounters with them.
This marks the English actor’s third major TV series role following the British teen drama Skins and the Hulu comedy The Great, which earned him an Emmy and Golden Globe nominations. Hoult first gained worldwide fame playing Hank McCoy, aka The Beast, in the X-Men prequels, before taking on the role of Lex Luthor in DCU’s Superman opposite David Corenswet.
All about the Harry Potter series
HBO’s ambitious reboot of JK Rowling’s Harry Potter books will see seven seasons adapting the seven novels. The books chronicle the life of Harry Potter, who discovers at 11 that he is a wizard and is enrolled at Hogwarts, a school of magic, where he discovers the secret world of wizards hidden within our world.
Newcomers Dominic McLaughlin, Alastair Stout, and Arabella Stanton have been cast as Harry and his friends, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger. Key cast members include Nick Frost as Rubeus Hagrid, John Lithgow as Albus Dumbledore, Paapa Essiedu as Severus Snape and Janet McTeer as Professor McGonagall. The first season will premiere on Dec 25, 2026.