The following podcast contains audio extracted from videos on the Harry Potter Theory YouTube channel.

Hey everyone, coming to you with more sad news today.

When I woke up this morning, I was bombarded with messages that Leslie Phillips, who famously

voiced the sorting hat in the Harry Potter films, has passed away at the age of 98.

Phillips, who was pushing a century, died peacefully in his sleep after a long battle with illness.

Though Phillips will be known to most of you as the voice behind Godrick Gryffindor's

hat, Phillips had a long and illustrious career well before the Harry Potter films, featuring

in over 200 movies, TV series and radio shows collectively.

He was also very well known for his role in the Carry On franchise in the late 50s.

His wife Zara had this to say of her husband's passing.

I've lost a wonderful husband and the public has lost a truly great showman.

He was quite simply a national treasure.

People loved him.

He was mobbed everywhere he went.

Phillips reprised the role of the sorting hat in 2001's Philosopher's Stone,

2002's Chamber of Secrets, and 2011's Deathly Hallows, where, as the Talking Wizard's hat,

he placed Hogwarts students into one of the school's four houses, Gryffindor, Slytherin,

Ravenclaw, or Hufflepuff.

And while Phillips doesn't physically appear on screen, his unique voice is entirely synonymous

with the character.

You can't really have the sorting hats without the iconic voice of Phillips.

Just recently we lost Robbie Coltrane who plays Rubius Hagrid, and in that video I mentioned that Coltrane

...