The former Harry Potter actor will star as Rosencrantz opposite About Time actor Joshua MCGuire's Guildenstern at London's Old Vic Theatre to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Sir Tom Stoppard's play, which expands upon the exploits of the two courtiers, who are minor characters in William Shakespeare's classic Hamlet.

Radcliffe and MCGuire starred together in TV show A Young Doctor’s Notebook and The Old Vic’s artistic director Matthew Warchus admits he was delighted to find out the two were already friends.

“We got them to do a reading of the play together and that was incredibly effective and successful,” he told London's Evening Standard. “The ingredients are there for a really good version of the play and secondarily the double-act is going to draw an audience who otherwise might never have come.

“That is always the thing in terms of having famous actors in a show - there is the exciting potential they will bring in an audience who would otherwise maybe not come but that is only good if the work they’re doing is good.”

Radcliffe, who starred in Broadway play Privacy this year (16), last appeared on the West End in The Cripple of Inishmaan in 2013.

The production opens for previews on 25 February (17).