'I Wanted To Prove Them Wrong:' Emma Watson Reveals Her University Professor Told Her To Quit Acting

The Bling Ring star took time away from the spotlight at university

Emma Watson has revealed just how close she was to quitting acting, revealing that even a professor at her university advised her to embark on another career in the years after her Harry Potter fame.

The 23-year-old shot to super stardom playing Hermione Granger for 10 years in the big screen adaptations of the Harry Potter books, but after hanging up her witch's cloak in 2011, Emma took time out to pursue her studies at university.

The Bling Ring star has admitted that she soon started questioning whether she could even carve out a career for herself in acting after Hermione.

"For a while I kind of bought into the hype of, 'Will they ever be able to play anything else?'," she told Entertainment Weekly. "It gave me a sense of paralysis and stage fright for a while."

The Hermione days! Emma starred in the Harry Potter series from the age of 11

Emma reveals that it was actually a comment from one of her professor's that gave her the determination to get back into the world of movies:

"A professor told me that they didn't think I should act, either. So I was really grappling with it and wasn't feeling good about it. And then, I don't know... it got so bad and people had put me in a box so much that it started pi**ing me off."

"I suddenly wanted to prove them wrong. It gave me fuel, in a way. I'm not sure why that shift happened."

Emma Watson has gone on to star in critically acclaimed hits The Perks of Being A Wallflower and The Bling Ring since Harry Potter (WENN)

Emma admits that it was only when she read the script for her 2012 movie The Perks of Being a Wallflower that she knew she could continue with her dream post Potter: 

"Falling in love with that and then having such a great experience on that movie kind of sealed the deal for me," she added. "I stopped intellectualising it, and it became much more instinctual. I just got the bug and got very driven all of a sudden, which I really wasn't before. But I'm so happy. It's all felt very new to me, really."

The Bling Ring is in cinemas now.