For the star of Harry Potter, you would think quieting a chatty audience member would be a simple, almost seamless task, but for Ian Hart who played Professor Quirrell in the first Potter film, it turned into an arduous ordeal at his West End play.
According to various accounts, Hart blew up in anger at an audience member who was talking throughout the production of Speaking on Monday night.
It took John Simm his co-star and several ushers to pull Hart off of the man who continued to insist throughout the altercation that he had not uttered very many words.
The audience member, Gerard Earley, stated that he was fearful of what Hart was going to do next, and stated that he is considering going to the police and pursuing assault charges.
Earley was attending the play with his girlfriend when Hart yelled from the stage for him to shut up. He stated that he noticed Hart staring at him as the play neared its end and then than Hart entered the audience and started to scream at him, at which point Earley said he felt scared.
According to Earley, Simm told Hart to ‘Leave It’ several times but Hart continued at him screaming at him for talking during the play and that he did not respect the work hart was doing or Hart’s performance.
Hart’s manager refused to comment along with the producers’ spokesman although the representatives of the producers did call Earley after the show.
A lawyer sitting behind Earley commented that Earley looked confused and that Hart just exploded with a crazy look in his eyes.
