» BACKGROUND
Evanna Lynch was born in the 16th of August 1991, and lives in Termonfeckin, County
Louth, Ireland with her father Donal, mother Marguerite elder sisters Mairead and
Emily, and her younger brother Patrick. She is currently studying at Our Lady’s College,
Greenhills; an all girls’ Catholic school in Dogheda. When she was younger she
attended Cartown National School. She annually attends the Centre for Talented
Youth of Ireland (CTYI) summer camp, which was set up especially for the gifted
students of Ireland. Even prior to be cast in the ‘Potter’ movies she was an avid
fan, claiming to have read the books several times each; in 2003, she was
hospitalised and was quite distraught to miss out on the ‘Order of the Phoenix’
book launch – she was released for the morning and attended the launch with “I
Love Harry Potter” scralwed on her arms and her nails painted in a snitch pattern
on every second finger. She also has pet cats named after ‘Potter’ characters,
including Luna and Dumbledore – unfortunately, her pet cat named Crookshanks
passed away in 2006.
» CAREER
It was revealed on 23 January 2006 that Lynch, who was then fourteen, had been cast
as Luna Lovegood in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix after her father flew her
to London for the open audition for the role, beating nearly 15,000 girls in the
auditions. She began the actual filming of Order of the Phoenix at the end of February
at Leavesden Studios in England. The open call was made because the producers felt
that a conventional actress would not be suitable for the role of the eccentric Luna
Lovegood. As producer David Heyman recounted in the ITV2 documentary, “Harry
Potter and the Order of the Phoenix: Behind the Magic,” “We had three girls who we
thought would be good, but they were going to act Luna, they weren’t going to be
Luna.” Lynch had the chance to meet Harry Potter author J. K. Rowling at the
Leavesden Studios during the early stages of the fifth film’s production. After a long
chat, Rowling had one thing to say about Lynch portraying Luna: “perfect.”
However, as Lynch has naturally dark blonde hair, her hair had to be bleached light
blonde for the role of Luna. On set Lynch became very good friends with fellow
actresses Bonnie Wright (who plays Ginny Weasley), Katie Leung (Cho Chang) and
Afshan Azad (Padma Patil). Since the release of the film, she has received many
positive reviews, being called one of the true “standouts” of the film.[10] When
receiving her James Joyce Award in 2008, Rowling said that Evanna Lynch’s voice was
the only one she “heard” while composing subsequent novels. Lynch also voiced
Luna Lovegood in the video game iterations of Harry Potter and the Order of the
Phoenix, and Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.
» FANDOM
Lynch is a huge Harry Potter fan and, according to her family, is obsessed with the
series. As a younger child, she constantly wrote to J.K. Rowling, and in one such letter
the youngster commented how much she would love to act in a Harry Potter film but
doubted this would happen as she lived in “this sleepy little place called Termonfeckin,
where nothing ever happened.” To Lynch’s surprise, Rowling replied, saying “Don’t be
too hard on Termonfeckin; it does have a brilliant name! And I come from a very
sleepy place.” In 2003, aged eleven, Lynch was disappointed that she would miss the
release of the fifth book in the series, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix as she
had been hospitalised. However, the hospital released her for the morning of the
launch and a local bookstore arranged for her to receive a copy signed by author
Rowling. Lynch showed up wearing a Harry Potter T-shirt, and blue nail polish that had
“Harry Potter” written on every other nail and a Golden Snitch on the rest. She also had
painted-on Harry Potter glasses and had written “I Love Harry Potter” down her arms.
Lynch’s love for the novels even saw her choosing to name her cat Luna, who has
had several kittens, one of them named Dumbledore. Another cat she had owned
which died in early 2006 had been named Crookshanks, after character Hermione
Granger’s cat
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