Robbie Coltrane at the premiere of 'Quantum of Solace' in 2008. Coltrane acted in the James Bond movies in the 1990s. (Credit: Gareth Cattermole/Getty Images)
(CNN Spanish) --
Robbie Coltrane was world famous for bringing Hagrid to life in the Harry Potter saga.
After his death at the age of 72, we review a long and praised career that goes beyond the universe of magicians.
He was part of another very famous British saga.
A Scotsman, Coltrane acted in the 1995 James Bond films
GoldenEye
and
1997's
The World Is Not Enough .
He played the role of Valentin Zukovsky, a former KGB Soviet intelligence service agent who becomes a mobster and owns a nightclub, a casino and a caviar factory.
In
GoldenEye
, Zukovsky who has a grudge against James Bond but ends up helping him.
In
The World Is Not Enough
he is the owner of a casino in Azerbaijan and a caviar factory and in the end he returns to assist Bond to escape from the evil Elektra.
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Coltrane's first production was in the 1979 series "Play for Today" and he was an extra in the
1980 film
Flash Gordon .
Before rising to world fame with the bearded Hagrid, Coltrane honed his comedy skills on the theater stage.
In the 1980s, the actor participated in a series of short scenes called "Alfresco" with the renowned Hugh Laurie, Stephen Fry and Emma Thompson.
Coltrane worked with Thompson on the drama series "Tutti Frutti," for which he earned his first British Academy Television Award nomination for Best Actor.
But his first break would come with the television series "Cracker" in the 1990s. The show, a crime drama, ran for three seasons between 1993 and 1995, with two subsequent specials.
The role of Hagrid, a half-giant, half-human character, came naturally to Coltrane.
He knew and loved the books because he read them to his children, he recalled in an interview.
Appearing in the HBO Max special "Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts," Coltrane recalled his time in the movies and Hagrid's impact.
“Everyone would like a really big, huge, strong, good man on their side, simple as that.
That's the attraction of Superman and these things,” he said.
"Hagrid was always obviously the good guy, wasn't he?"
After the Harry Potter films, he provided his voice for films such as
Arthur Christmas
and
Brave
, the Disney animated film.
In 2016, he starred alongside Julie Walters in the Hulu miniseries "National Treasure."
His last acting credit is "Urban Myths", a series in which he played the role of Orson Welles.
With information from CNN's Sandra González
Harry Potter
