The AppleTV+ horror-thriller series Servant does many things right, and one of those things is giving Rupert Grint an opportunity to display his acting talents. Grint is best known for his role as Ron Weasley in the Harry Potter series.
In Servant, he plays Julian Pearce, the brother to Dorothy Turner (Lauren Ambrose) who constantly intrudes on the Turners’ everyday life. Dorothy had lost her baby Jericho in an accident some time ago. With the help of her husband, Sean (Toby Kebbell), Dorothy tries to cope with the trauma by taking on a baby doll as a replacement. In keeping with the performance, the Turners hire a nanny, Leanne (Nell Tiger Free), whose arrival seemingly turns the doll into a real baby. While all the performances are stellar, the most well-known name among them is Rupert Grint, thanks to his Harry Potter fame.
His turn as Julian Pearce showcases Grint’s acting ability beyond those films that defined his younger years. While Servant can be praised for its creative opportunities and technical achievements, its success hinges upon the actors and their performances, not the least of which comes from Rupert Grint.
Ron Weasley is a clumsy, bumbling boy when he is first introduced in The Sorcerer’s Stone. The youngest brother among the Weasleys, only older than his sister Ginny (Bonnie Wright), Ron is probably one of the most immature students at Hogwarts. He quickly develops a friendship with the legendary Harry Potter himself (Danielle Radcliffe) and Hermione Granger (Emma Watson). Gradually, throughout the series of movies, which garnered billions of dollars at the box office, Ron eventually matures, especially as he begins to admit his feelings to Hermione. By the end of the franchise, he not only experienced love but also loss, losing his brother Fred at the Battle of Hogwarts. With a recurring role in such a successful franchise, Rupert Grint quickly became cemented in the character of Ron Weasley. A decade after the final film’s conclusion, he very much still is, as many fans and cast members demonstrated in the 20th anniversary special on HBO Max.
The following contains spoilers for AppleTV+ series, Servant.
How does someone break away from such an iconic role? One possibility is to completely depart from the character in a series of roles that play against type. That is exactly what Robert Pattinson has been doing since his tenure as the glittery vampire Edward Cullen from the Twilight series — before he took up the cape and cowl as the new Bruce Wayne in The Batman, Pattinson took on darker and more twisted roles in films such as Good Time and The Lighthouse, which played against the teen heartthrob image that made him a name in Hollywood and audiences’ minds. To a lesser extent, Rupert Grint has appeared in small projects, such as the Crackle original series and reboot of Guy Ritchie’s film Snatch and the BBC limited series The ABC Murders based on the novel by Agatha Christie. However, his role in AppleTV+’s Servant is probably the most high-profile role yet since Harry Potter, as the show was among the first to premiere with the streaming service alongside The Morning Show and See.
Long gone are Ron’s tattered and ragged clothes. Instead, Julian Pearce consistently dresses in suits of many colors, vests included. Whereas the Weasleys live in a crumbling house away from the city, Julian lives in the wealthiest part of the City of Brotherly Love, Philadelphia. And yes, Rupert Grint departs from his own British accent and takes on an American one. All of these character traits mark a departure from the Ron Weasley we all have grown accustomed to. Grint is no longer the squeamish, childhood best friend of the titular hero of a franchise. He is all grown up, a wine glass in hand in almost every scene.
But even in his lofty, arrogant demeanor, Grint still manages to pull off a comedy of a different kind — not from his clumsy, immature hijinks, but from the wealth that defines his character, Julian Pearce. For example, in the current season of Servant, Season 3, Julian becomes somewhat insecure about sleeping the Turners’ nanny Leanne. Because Leanne comes from a rural community in Wisconsin, Julian has a lot to say about her when she first starts working for the Turners.
However, it becomes ironic that Julian and Leanne eventually do spark a connection and end up having a physical relationship. In this season, Julian becomes more insecure about their closeted relationship. He suggests that Leanne see someone closer to her age, someone who is more physically fit and attractive than he is, “Someone with abs.” But Julian actually ends up taking his fitness seriously, first in the living room on a yoga mat, and then ordering some gym equipment for the Turners’ home.
Later, when Julian asks his friend Roscoe (Philip James Brannon) to help prove that the new baby isn’t his sister Dorothy’s, they meet at an outdoor gym. “Why are we out here, anyway?” Roscoe asks. “Well,” Julian answers, “Our usual gym smells like an old man with an incurable staph infection.” They have this conversation while Julian is stretching in a lunge and wearing a green jumpsuit. “Fuck,” he interjects, having pulled something. It’s funny to laugh at someone who clearly thinks he is better than everyone else yet still tries to better himself, only to suffer cramps. And Grint plays this off so naturally. His little snide remarks aren’t overplayed for laughs. Instead, Grint perfectly captures the egotistic, snobbish persona of an aristocrat who’s had everything handed to him on a silver platter.
And Grint also delivers on the dramatic side. In the same episode, Season 3, Episode 3, we get flashbacks to when Julian finds Dorothy at home with the dead body of baby Jericho. Of course, that dramatic day has defined Dorothy and the Turner family since, but these flashbacks are a reminder that it was Julian who witnessed the immediate aftermath of that day. As Julian tries to console Dorothy in his embrace, Grint displays the intense grief and anxiety of the character upon finding such a horrifying scene. He portrays the helpless desperation on his face, nervously calling his father on the phone, not knowing what to do. Julian is willing to do whatever it takes to keep the Turner family safe, and mostly, he just wants his sister Dorothy to be happy. And when he fails and disappoints his sister, Grint successfully captures that sense of familial guilt and regret.
What’s interesting with Rupert Grint’s involvement with the M. Night Shyamalan produced show is that Shyamalan was close to directing the very first Harry Potter film. However, while Chris Columbus took on the first directing duties of the franchise, Shyamalan went on to direct the acclaimed “comic book film” ahead of its time, Unbreakable. In Interview Magazine, Shyamalan states his praise for the kind of actor Grint has become as an adult, “You’re just genuinely the most relaxed, easygoing, nicest guy, and yet, the precision of your craft is incredible.”
Clearly, Grint has made an impression on the director, so much so that Shyamalan has cast him in his next upcoming horror mystery film Knock at the Cabin. Through Servant, Rupert Grint demonstrates that there’s more to his acting than playing Ron Weasley, and it’ll be interesting to see what he does with the new Shyamalan project and other projects to come.