What Happened To The Dursleys After The End Of Harry Potter

The very first characters that readers meet in the "Harry Potter" series, written by Joanne Kathleen Rowling and first released in 1997, are the non-magical Dursleys, which seems like an odd introduction to a book about a young boy who discovers he's a wizard. Quickly, those same readers learn that the Dursleys have their life turned upside down when, one night, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry headmaster Albus Dumbledore (played in the first film by Richard Harris) drops the orphaned Harry Potter (played throughout his childhood by Daniel Radcliffe) on their doorstep. Despite protestations from patriarch Vernon (Richard Griffiths) and his wife Petunia (Fiona Shaw) — the latter of whom is Harry's biological aunt on his mother's side — Harry ends up living with the Dursleys full-time until his eleventh birthday, when he can finally escape their casual cruelty and start attending Hogwarts.

On the online "Harry Potter" encyclopedia Wizarding World, Rowling says of the Dursleys, "The Dursleys are reactionary, prejudiced, narrow-minded, ignorant and bigoted; most of my least favourite things." This is certainly an apt description of Vernon, Petunia, and their odious son Dudley (Harry Melling) — so why are they even a part of the overall story? What role do the Dursleys play in "Harry Potter?" What happens to them at the end of the original books and films? Who played them on-screen, and where are they now?

At first glance, the Dursleys are simple, one-dimensional villains who trap Harry at their house on Privet Drive in Little Whinging, starve him, and emotionally torment him whenever he's not at Hogwarts. The family is actually extremely important, though, or at least one of their number is: Harry's Aunt Petunia.

Throughout the books and films, Petunia isn't any nicer to Harry than Vernon ever is — Dudley has a slight change of heart towards the end of the series after Harry saves his life during a dementor attack in "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" — but the truth is that the blood she shares with Harry's mother Lily offers powerful protection to her nephew. As Dumbledore tells Vernon and Petunia during a seriously unwanted visit to their home in the sixth book, "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince," allowing Harry into their home even just once a year protected him from attacks by Dark Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes) throughout his childhood. Petunia knew this, as she and Dumbledore were secretly in touch around the time of Lily's death — and during "Order of the Phoenix," when Vernon nearly kicks Harry out of the house over the aforementioned dementor attack and Dumbledore sends Petunia a stern warning — and it's the only maternal instinct she ever shows where Harry is concerned.

Despite the Dursleys' cartoonish villainy, Harry and Dudley have a (sort of) touching moment during both the book and film of the franchise's final installment, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" as Dudley asks why Harry isn't safely relocating with the family, and even Petunia gets a small moment of redemption in a scene that was, sadly, deleted. In the book, Petunia ultimately leaves her home without saying anything profound to Harry. In the deleted scene, Harry warns her of the danger posed by Voldemort and his Death Eaters; Petunia's response is gutting. "Do you think I don't know what they're capable of?" Petunia says to Harry. "You didn't just lose a mother that night in Godric's Hollow, you know. I lost a sister."

So what happens after the Dursleys vacate their home on Privet Drive and the wizarding world goes to war with Voldemort (and defeats him)? In the stage play "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child," which was penned by Rowling herself, Harry gives a blanket he used as a baby to his son Albus Severus and reveals some pretty huge things about the Dursleys. "I was given to the Dursleys wrapped in it," Harry says of the blanket (via Wizarding World). "I thought it had gone forever and then – when your Great Aunt Petunia died, hidden amongst her possessions, surprisingly, Dudley found this – and he kindly sent it on to me, and ever since then – well, any time I've wanted luck I've found it and just tried to hold it."

Meanwhile, in an archived post from Rowling's own website, she acknowledged that some fans may have hoped that the magical lineage in Petunia's blood could have essentially "transferred" to any children Dudley ever had, but that "a short period of reflection convinced me that any latent wizarding genes would never survive contact with Uncle Vernon's DNA, so I didn't do it." Still, she said that Harry and Dudley kept in touch: "However, I know that after Dudley's brave attempt at reconciliation at the start of Deathly Hallows, the two cousins would have remained on 'Christmas Card' terms for the rest of their lives, and that Harry would have taken his family to visit Dudley's when they were in the neighbourhood (occasions dreaded by [Harry's children] James, Albus and Lily)." Not much else is known about the fate of the Dursleys, but one can imagine that, after enduring the events of "Deathly Hallows," they likely returned to their humdrum life on Privet Drive.

Okay, so with all of that out of the way, what have Richard Griffiths, Fiona Shaw, and Harry Melling been doing since they played Vernon, Petunia, and Dudley in the "Harry Potter" films? Let's start with some sad news. Three years after the family's final appearance in 2010's "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows — Part 1," Griffiths passed away at the age of 65 due to complications from cardiac surgery in England; the actor was well-known for non-"Potter" projects like "Withnail and I," "The History Boys," and many more, and he also appeared on stage with Daniel Radcliffe in the 2008 Broadway production of "Equus," giving the two on-screen family members a chance to do something very different.

Thankfully, Shaw — one of the most talented women to ever walk the boards in England — is still working steadily. Besides classics like "My Left Foot" and "The Tree of Life," Shaw has appeared in a huge number of prestige TV shows, including "Killing Eve," "Fleabag" (which won her an Emmy for her guest role in the hit show's second season), "True Detective: Night Country," and the "Star Wars" series "Andor." Onstage, Shaw has starred in incredible projects like Samuel Beckett's wild play "Happy Days" (a one-woman show where she's submerged in garbage), "Medea," and "The Seagull."

Lest you think Melling has been slacking since playing Dudley, let us assure you that the young actor has carved out a seriously impressive career for himself after "Harry Potter." After donning a fatsuit as Dudley, Melling has shown up in buzzy projects like "The Old Guard" with Charlize Theron, "The Queen's Gambit" alongside Anya Taylor-Joy, "The Tragedy of MacBeth" with Denzel Washington, and "The Pale Blue Eye" opposite Christian Bale. All three of the Dursleys will live on forever in the "Harry Potter" films, though, which are available to stream on Peacock.