After Harry Potter's penis won rave reviews for its horse-stabbing role in the stage-production of Equus this spring, people assumed that whoever would follow it would either be a) a respected big-name actor or b) Lily Allen's little brother.
And what do you know, it looks very much like the latter. Daniel Radcliffe's Equus replacement has been named as Alfie Allen – brother of Lily Allen, son of Keith Allen and subject of a pop song about what a lazy pot-smoking waster Alfie Allen is. Although Alfie Allen has had a few small acting roles in the past, Equus will mark the first time he's ever got his knob out and blinded a horse with a spike at the behest of a disturbing horse-god onstage. Not that he'll be doing that any more, of course – to suit Alfie's slightly chavvy tendencies, the storyline of Equus has now been altered so that now Alfie will just need to get naked and happyslap a horse outside JD Sports, then run home and upload it to YouTube.
Equus is something of a magical play. Not only does it raise important questions about freedom of spirit when altered by psychiatric treatment, but until recently it was the only place where you could see Harry Potter with his wanger out. Looking back, it was a masterstroke for Daniel Radcliffe to sign up for Equus – at once it removed him from the children's movies for which he was famous and increased his credentials as a serious actor. It helped that he was good in the play, too – everyone loved Harry Potter in Equus. The Telegraph called Daniel Radcliffe a "thrilling stage actor of unexpected range and depth" and hecklerspray commenter Jazmin added "I SAW HIS COCK IT HUGE…I WISH HE WAS MY HUSBAND…HIS FUCKIN HOT…WISH I HAD GONE 2 THAT PLAY!=(."
But Daniel Radcliffe couldn't star in Equus forever, because eventually his pubes would have gone grey and freaked everyone out, so instead the producers of Equus have decided to recast the lead role. And which lucky actor has the honour of superseding Daniel Radcliffe? Why, it's Lily Allen's brother Alfie Allen. You may have seen Alfie Allen in a small role in Atonement this year, or as Berkhamp On Double Bass in 2004's critical smash-hit Agent Cody Banks 2: Destination London, or you might just know Alfie Allen from that song Lily Allen wrote about him where he was played in the video by a muppet in a hoodie. Either way, you'll be able to see his penis before very long. And, as The Times reports, Alfie Allen's reputation didn't harm him one bit:
Lily immortalised her brother in the song, Alfie, which begins: "My little brother's in his bedroom smoking weed, I tell him he should get up 'cos it's nearly half past three." But Equus producer David Pugh said he made sure the young actor had changed his ways before hiring him. He told the Daily Mail: "We arranged an 8am breakfast at the Wolseley restaurant with (writer) Peter Shaffer and Alfie to see if he was still a stay-in-bed-all-day kind of boy, but I think he was the first to arrive." Shaffer recommended Alfie after seeing him in the Keira Knightley film Atonement.
Although it'd be absurd to assume that Alfie Allen in Equus will generate even a fraction of the media frothing that Daniel Radcliffe caused, we should add that he's probably more genetically disposed to nudity than Radcliffe ever was. Anyone who's ever seen Shallow Grave has seen his father's penis, for example, so maybe that brave streak of proud exhibitionism is present within Alfie too, which should make his Equus electrifying. Of course, there's an equal chance that Alfie Allen is genetically predisposed to having superfluous nipples covering most of his body, too. In which case, you know, ugh.
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