Tom Felton responded to those long-running romance rumors surrounding him and his Harry Potter co-star, Emma Watson, in the most cryptic way! “We are something, if that makes any sense,” Tom told Entertainment Tonight in an interview published on June 3. While he didn’t elaborate on what “something” meant, Tom added, “We’ve been very close for a long time. I adore her.”
Tom, 33, wasn’t done gushing about Emma, 31! “I think she’s fantastic. Hopefully she returns the compliment,” the British actor said. Tom did think the romance rumors stem from the rivalry between his bad boy character, Draco Malfoy, and Emma’s good wizard character, Hermione Granger, who hail from different Hogwarts Houses; naturally, people love a good enemies-to-lovers romance.
“As far as the romantic side of it, I think that’s a Slytherin/Gryffindor thing rather than a Tom and Emma thing,” Tom then said in regards to all those romance rumors. He then switched back to giving Emma high praise, saying, “I absolutely think the world of her. I think to be a part of what we’ve all been a part of, but for her to be the only girl, certainly the youngest one on set, to grow up with what she had to grow up with was incredibly exciting. You’re going to get me teary now, but no, I think she’s a fantastic influence on the world.”
Tom doesn’t just speak to Emma, though — he also talks to other Harry Potter co-stars like Daniel Radcliffe (who played Harry Potter) and Rupert Grint (who played Ron Weasley). “We do stay in touch, quite frequently… It is nice that we’re in sort of four different corners of the earth and yet when we catch up, it feels like yesterday that this was all going on,” Tom revealed, as he spoke with ET before the flagship Harry Potter shop opens in New York City.
Emma Watson, Daniel Radcliffe and Tom Felton behind the scenes of "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone", 2001. pic.twitter.com/2NFA5SCNlj
— Scene Universe (@SceneUniverseTR) May 27, 2021
As to how these romance rumors all began, it was Rupert who admitted that “there was always something” between Emma and Tom while speaking with Entertainment Tonight in 2019. “There was a little bit of a spark,” he added, although Ron’s actor then clarified that what Tom and Emma had was supposedly “like any kind of playground romance.”
Even Evanna Lynch — who played Luna Lovegood in Harry Potter — teased that her co-stars were crushing on another while filming the earlier Harry Potter films (although she didn’t specify who). Evanna didn’t join the cast until the fifth installment of the series, and so she told Us Weekly on June 3, “[I joined when] everyone had kind of grown out of their crushes and they were moving on to, like, people in the outside world. And I felt that like, damn, I missed all the drama! It was so fun the last film, according to some stories. But no, by the time I got there, they were all mature and those hormones were calming down.”
Emma Watson & Tom Felton's friendship is the cutest ! 💛 pic.twitter.com/Nf6gpDn6vm
— Meg ♡ (@sweetx0love25) November 8, 2018
Emma is also in a relationship at the moment. She was just seen with her boyfriend, businessman Leo Robinton, during an outing in Los Angeles on May 15. After the rare outing, Emma seemed to deny the engagement rumors that had been swirling.