HBO has cast an Italian actress as Parvati Patil, an Indian-origin Harry Potter character from the original book and the subsequent film series, drawing flak from fans for their alleged racist approach.

Alessia Leoni will play Parvati in the upcoming Harry Potter series. The character was portrayed by Shefali Chowdhury in the Harry Potter movies. Sitara Shah played the role of her twin sister Padma Patil.

“This is frustrating. Why cast an Italian who just looks brown to play Parvati Patil? They easily could’ve cast an actual Indian actress. So much for “diversity” @HBO. No hate to the kid, but still,” one of them wrote on X. “All we needed was an Indian girl to play Parvati Patil,” he added.

“The name Parvati is literally a Hindu Indian goddess. Patil is as Indian a name as it gets,” another fan tweeted.

“Beautiful girl @HBO @jk_rowling - I hope Alessia Leoni playing Parvati Patil is Indian or were there not enough brown girls to choose from?” an X user wrote. “It’s funny how when roles are race-swapped the other way (ie Snape and Hermione) people go nuts,” she added.

Previously, the Harry Potter series makers were lambasted for casting Papa Essiedu, a black actor, as Severus Snape, a role originally played by Alan Rickman in the Harry Potter movies. The casting for Harry’s geeky friend Hermione, set to be played by Arabella Stanton, also caught the ire of netizens for her ethnicity.

“It feels like they just found a brown-skinned girl and called it a day. There’s barely any info on her ethnicity. How hard is it to cast an actual Indian girl to play Parvati Patil?” wrote a longtime fan of the Harry Potter franchise.

Users on Reddit, too, questioned the casting choice for Parvati. “Have they just cast an Italian as one of the only Indian characters?” asked one of them. “I’m so sick of Hollywood casting biracial, half white desi actors,” another Redditor wrote.

Calling the casting an “absolute joke”, a Reddit user posted, “Yeah, god forbid they cast a full Desi actor.”

Some Redditors also argued about Leoni’s ethnicity, wondering whether the actress has any Indian roots. “The casting call pictures looks like a desi girl. I mentioned this in another comment, some Catholic Indians have Latin-like names. I knew someone whose family was from Goa but had a name similar to the actress,” one of them shared.

Apart from Leoni, HBO also announced the cast for the Dursleys, Malfoys and other characters, including Seamus Finnigan, Lavender Brown, and Cornelius Fudge.

The makers have cast Katherine Parkinson as Molly Weasley, Lox Pratt as Draco Malfoy, Johnny Flynn as Lucius Malfoy, Leo Earley as Seamus Finnigan, Sienna Moosah as Lavender Brown, Bel Powley as Petunia Dursley, Daniel Rigby as Vernon Dursley, Bertie Carvel as Cornelius Fudge.

Recently, the cast for the golden trio of Harry, Hermione and Ron were announced, a decision that mostly received positive responses from fans of the novels by J.K. Rowling.

While Dominic McLaughlin will play the role of ‘The Boy Who Lived’, Arabella Stanton is set to feature as Harry’s geeky friend Hermione Granger, and Alastair Stout as Harry’s red-haired bestie Ron Weasley.

The Harry Potter reboot for television, announced in 2021, is described as a faithful adaptation of J.K. Rowling's best-selling novel series about the wizarding world.

The first season is reportedly scheduled to premiere in 2026.