Emma Watson: 9 auditions over 18 months
Emma Watson went through nine Harry Potter auditions over more than a year and a half starting from age nine before winning the role of Hermione Granger.
Snapshot · On Purpose with Jay Shetty
Jay’s Must-Listens: The Biggest Lessons From 10 of Our Most Inspiring Conversations
Explore episode
Jul 8, 2026
Where this was said
Growing Up as Hermione Granger
At 33:20 · chapter starts 31:22
Emma Watson begins with an admission that cuts through Hollywood mythology: when cast members are asked in press junkets whether they're all friends, everyone nods enthusiastically, but the truth is almost no one sees each other outside of work. Schedules are brutal, energy reserves are depleted, and real friendship requires proximity, time, and presence — all of which big productions structurally deny. [1] — Emma Watson "Everyone on a big film nods enthusiastically when asked if the cast are friends. The truth is almost no one has seen each other outside of …" 29:50 The truly painful part, she says, is having to perform a closeness you desperately wish were real. The Harry Potter franchise was different, she notes — it had a genuine family feeling — but even that had its limits. Jay Shetty then steers the conversation to the audition origin story, and Emma describes bringing seven Beanie Babies and lucky talismans to her first audition at age nine, certain from the moment it was announced that Hermione was hers. She had never auditioned professionally. Yet she completed nine rounds over more than a year and a half, sustained entirely by the love she felt for the character and the books her father had read to her on long drives to France. The segment ends on a word she keeps returning to: destiny.
Emma Watson's Nine Auditions and a Sense of Destiny
Emma Watson brought seven Beanie Babies and lucky talismans to her first Harry Potter audition. She never once considered she was auditioning for any other role. Nine auditions and eighteen months later, she was Hermione.
Kobe Bryant: Be Still and Unpack the Fear
Kobe Bryant didn't fight fear — he sat with it. When afraid, he unpacked it methodically: 'I might miss the shot. Then what? People will talk. Then what?' By the end of the chain, the fear had dissolved into imagination.
Similar snapshots
Music school dropout rate ~87–90%
The music conservatory Mark Manson attended had a dropout rate of approximately 87–90%, illustrating how few people reach the 'religious' stage of commitment to a creative calling.
AI novel 'Call Me, I'll Hide the Body' sold for $2.4M
A novel called 'Call Me, I'll Hide the Body' triggered a 14-publisher bidding war and sold for $2.4 million before critics alleged it was predominantly written by AI.
John Mulaney cold-texted Robby
John Mulaney cold-texted Robby Hoffman out of nowhere to offer to produce her Netflix special, which became Wake Up.
Posed as a courier to pitch HBO Canada
Robby Hoffman posed as a courier to hand-deliver her spec script directly to the president of HBO Canada early in her career.
Two Netflix specials filmed in one night
Robby and Mulaney filmed two shows in one night for the Netflix special; after the first they knew they had it, so the second was a victory lap.
250–300 shows per year
Jimmy Carr performs up to 300 shows a year, often doing two shows per night, which he says reduces nerves rather than increasing them.
Comedy optimal speech: 92 BPM
Jimmy Carr says that speaking at roughly 92 beats per minute is the optimal cadence for comedy and public speaking, including political speeches like Obama's.
The oldest joke is ~4,000 years old
The oldest recorded joke appears in a Roman book called 'The Lover of Laughter' and is still funny — a barber asking how a man wants his haircut, who replies 'in silence'.
Overton window expanded by comedians
Jimmy Carr argues that comedians like George Carlin, Richard Pryor, and Dave Chappelle have permanently expanded the conversational Overton window on sex, politics, and taboo topics.
