"We've known each other since he was 11," since the first Potter film, says Griffiths, 61. He smiles fondly at his 19-year-old colleague, with whom he is co-starring in the first Broadway revival of Equus, Peter Shaffer's 1974 Tony winner for Best Play.

"Working with Richard on Equus made me feel that doing the play would be less terrifying than it possibly could have been otherwise," says Radcliffe, the trust and ease of their relationship apparent in every word and gesture. "It gives you confidence. Richard's so experienced I know that if I mess anything up or if anything goes wrong we can salvage it."

"The play was shown to me, and I wanted to do it. It wasn't so much that I had the ambition to do theatre. I wanted to do Equus, and the medium for Equus was theatre. If I'd gone off and done another fantasy film, people would have said, 'Oh, he's not stretching himself.' But then if I'd gone and played a terrorist, they would have said, 'Oh, it smacks of his desperation to be seen as something else.' So you have to find that middle ground." And "a play like Equus," he says, "comes with a certain literary clout. And, of course, I was going to do it with Richard."

"Absolutely," he says. "I'd love to do Shakespeare. I'd love to play Puck. I'm short, and I think I have an impish quality."

But there's more. Strang sings advertising jingles, and Radcliffe has been taking singing lessons. And, he says, a Broadway musical beckons, at least eventually. "The part I'd ultimately like to play, maybe in 20 years, is Bobby in Stephen Sondheim's Company. It's my favorite musical by a long way — and the lyrics are beyond superb."