13 surprising things you probably didn't know near 'Harry Potter and the Sorcerer'southward Stone'

Dumbledore, Hogwarts map, Dursleys

Richard Harris turned downwards Dumbledore three times, and they hung dead mice on Aunt Petunia's frock.
Warner Bros. Pictures
  • We previously found 16 hidden details in "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Rock" that you might have missed.
  • Now, we've pulled together 13 backside-the-scenes facts almost the making of the first "Harry Potter" movie that yous wouldn't know unless you're a Potterhead.
  • The filmmakers tried out contact lenses for Daniel Radcliffe and fake teeth for Emma Watson, merely neither worked.
  • Dumbledore role player Richard Harris turned down the role iii times.
  • Visit Insider's homepage for more stories.

Richard Harris turned down the function of Dumbledore three times but eventually said aye after his granddaughter threatened to never speak to him once again.

Richard Harris played Albus Dumbledore for two of the eight movies.
Warner Bros. Pictures

Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore is ane of the most iconic characters in fantasy fiction. The role player who portrayed him in "The Wizard'south Stone," the late Richard Harris, is pretty iconic himself. But the marriage between Dumbledore and Harris well-nigh never happened, as the Irish gaelic role player turned down the office three times.

In an interview with Zap2it via the Guardian in 2001, Harris said: "All I knew is that they kept offering me the part and raising the salary every time they chosen. I kept turning it down."

"Anyone involved has to concur to be in the sequels, all of them, and that'southward non how I wanted to spend the last years of my life, and so I said no over and over again," he added.

It was Harris' granddaughter Ella that somewhen convinced him to take on the office, however.

"She said, 'Papa, I hear you lot're not going to be in the Harry Potter movie,' and she said, 'If you don't play Dumbledore then I will never speak to you lot again,'" he said.

Robin Williams wanted the role of Hagrid.

Robbie Coltrane concluded upwardly playing Rubeus Hagrid.
Carl Court/AFP/Getty Images/Warner Bros. Pictures

The late Robin Williams reportedly wanted to play Rubeus Hagrid in the films but was turned down.

"Robin [Williams] had chosen [manager Chris Columbus] considering he really wanted to be in the movie, but it was a British-only edict, and once he said no to Robin, he wasn't going to say yes to anybody else, that'southward for sure," casting director Janet Hirshensom told HuffPost in 2016. "It couldn't exist."

Unfortunately for Williams, the books' writer J.K. Rowling was insistent on having a British actors-only cast.

Williams besides seemingly alluded to this himself in an interview with the New York Mail service in 2001 (quoted here via The Guardian): "There were a couple of parts I would have wanted to play, merely there was a ban on [using] American actors."

Steven Spielberg worked on the motion picture before dropping out.

Christopher Columbus ended up directing "The Sorcerer's Rock."
AP Images

Steven Spielberg has created some of the all-time family movies of all time, including "E.T." and "Jurassic Park," and was attached to making "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer'due south Stone" for quite a while.

In a 2012 interview with Digital Spy, Spielberg said: "I was offered 'Harry Potter.' I adult it for about five or half dozen months with [screenwriter] Steve Kloves, and then I dropped out."

"I simply felt that I wasn't set up to make an all-kids picture show and my kids idea I was crazy," he continued. "And the books were by that time popular, so when I dropped out, I knew it was going to be a phenomenon."

Terry Gilliam said that J.K. Rowling originally wanted him to direct the movie.

Terry Gilliam is best known for being part of Monty Python.
Kurt Krieger/Corbis via Getty Images

Another manager who says they were considered for the project was Terry Gilliam. As part of Monty Python, Gilliam is known for his zanier work and has directed movies such every bit "12 Monkeys" and "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas."

In 2013, at Entertainment Weekly's Cape Town Moving-picture show Fest, Gilliam said that Rowling wanted him to directly "The Sorcerer'southward Stone."

"J.K. Rowling and the producer wanted me. And so wiser people — studio heads — prevailed," he said. "I was the clear option. At one point they approached Alan Parker and he said, 'Why are you talking to me? Gilliam is the guy who should exist doing this!' Only I knew I was never going to go the chore."

Watch the full video below:

The last scene in the film was also the very commencement scene that was shot.

In the last scene Harry, Ron, and Hermione board the Hogwarts Express to head home.
Warner Bros. Pictures

The outset scene ever shot in the "Harry Potter" film series must have been pretty weird for the bandage, particularly Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, and Rupert Grint, considering it was actually the last scene chronologically in "The Sorcerer's Rock."

"The thing we shot on the first solar day of Sorcerer's Rock was the final train sequence where Harry looks at Hogwarts and Emma, Dan, and Rupert are huddled outside of the train," manager Christopher Columbus told Entertainment Weekly's Binge Podcast.

In this terminal scene, Harry, Ron, and Hermione say goodbye to Hagrid and Hogwarts and board the Hogwarts express to head dwelling (although it isn't really home for Harry). The characters were all maxim goodbye to each other, but the actors were simply getting started on their very first scene in what would exist a 10-year journey.

Emma Watson was meant to vesture fake teeth in order to play Hermione, only couldn't speak properly in them.

Hermione had buck teeth in the books.
Warner Bros. Pictures

In the books, Hermione is described as having bucked teeth. The filmmakers tried altering Watson's appearance for the film by giving her a fake pair of teeth to wear, just Watson only managed to shoot i scene (over again, that kickoff scene shot) using these as she couldn't speak properly in them.

"It was a big affair in the books about [Hermione's] teeth. She sort of had an overbite, so [Emma's] wearing imitation teeth in that scene," manager Christopher Columbus told Amusement Weekly's Binge Podcast. "And I realized that she's never going to be able to perform with these huge fake teeth in her mouth for the remainder of the movie. So if you look closely, you can see some fake teeth."

They used the food in the great hall feasts for 3 days of shooting, which means it smelled atrocious.

The Swell Hall hosts a banquet for Hogwarts students every night.
Warner Bros. Pictures

Warwick Davis, who played both Griphook the Goblin and Professor Flitwick throughout the movies, revealed in a 2014 interview with UK tabloid The Mirror that the Great Hall feasts pictured in the movies never smelled as good equally they looked.

"A lot of not bad feasts happened in there. You may film them for three or 4 days and the first 24-hour interval you pace in at that place, they serve y'all a plate of food with lots of meats, vegetables, and roast potatoes and yous tin can eat the food," Davis said.

"The next day, they go, 'Don't swallow the food' ... you just pretend at present, it'due south been in that location all night. The fourth day, you could smell the Great Hall before y'all got in it. The food was the aforementioned food and it had quite an astonishing olfactory property," he said.

J.Yard. Rowling drew a map of Hogwarts for the production designer, who referenced it throughout all viii movies.

Stuart Craig was the production designer for the film.
JK Rowling/Warner Bros. Pictures

Stuart Craig was the production designer of the "Harry Potter" movies, and rightfully earned an Oscar nomination for "The Sorcerer's Stone" (plus three further Oscar nominations for "Harry Potter" movies).

In his first meeting with J.K. Rowling in 1999, Craig asked the writer nigh the geography of Hogwarts castle and its surrounding area. Rowling then drew a map of Hogwarts for Craig, and Craig kept it and referred to it on every post-obit film.

He spoke almost the map in the behind-the-scenes extras.

"This drawing is Jo Rowling'due south cartoon, that she executed in just a few minutes," he said. "As you see it has all the primary ingredients. The Dark Forest is here, the Whomping Willow, the Quidditch Pitch, Hogwarts Castle itself, the blackness lake is there. The perimeter route, Hogsmeade hamlet. She had a very, very exact and precise agreement of her globe and her creation. She knew exactly the relationship between all the elements. So she was able to give information technology to us, and that became our bible."

Rupert Grint got the part of Ron by dressing upwardly as a female drama teacher and rapping.

Rupert Grint'south audience tape clearly caught the eye of the producers.
Warner Bros. Pictures

Rupert Grint secured the part of Ron Weasley in a pretty unorthodox fashion. The player told Rosie O'Donnell in 2001 that he saw a casting phone call on Newsround. Grint and then said that he saw other kids sending in tapes of themselves, and decided to do the same thing.

"I really wanted to be in this film, so I made this videotape. First, I dressed upwards as my drama instructor, who was a girl so it was kind of scary," Grint said. "And then I made this rap song of how much I wanted to exist in the film."

Grint said he sent it in and soon heard back from the producers, who offered him an audition. The rest is history.

Watch the full video beneath:

They had to hang dead mice from Petunia's apron so that the owls would look at her instead of the camera

Fiona Shaw plays Aunt Petunia.
Warner Bros. Pictures

Working with animals is difficult and at that place were a lot of animals to work with in the "Harry Potter" films — mostly owls.

In a 2019 interview with the AV Club, Fiona Shaw recalled difficulties with the owls in 1 scene that didn't make the last cutting of the movie.

"I remember I was doing a scene in the kitchen where Petunia looks out the window and there are owls looking in at her," she said. "But the problem was that the owls kept looking at the camera, which was behind them. And so they tied a dead mouse to the forepart of my frock. So all the owls merely fixated on the expressionless mouse and the camera was able to laissez passer unimpeded."

Scout the deleted scene here:

Rupert Grint drew a caricature of Alan Rickman during the potions lesson scene, and Rickman got Grint to autograph it for him.

Alan Rickman kept Rupert Grint'southward drawing.
Warner Bros. Pictures

In backside-the-scenes interviews with the cast, Rupert Grint said that he would doodle in his book with his quill (just like Ron himself would in the books). During the potions lesson scene in which we are first introduced to Professor Snape, one of the things he doodled was late actor Alan Rickman, who played Snape.

Grint said: "I was simply doodling with my quill in the book. I drew this rather unpretty picture of Alan Rickman, and as I was drawing it Alan Rickman was standing correct behind me. And I was so scared."

Luckily for Grint, Rickman had a sense of humor near it and actually took a liking to the drawing. In behind-the-scenes extras on the last motion-picture show, "Deathly Hallows Part ii," Rickman recalled: "I made him sign information technology and I take information technology in my possession. And I'm very fond of it."

Watch the total clips beneath:

They had to shoot certain scenes twice due to the different book titles in the The states and UK.

Nicolas Flamel created the philosopher'southward/sorcerer's stone.
Warner Bros. Pictures

The book and movie were called "The Philosopher'due south Stone" everywhere apart from in the US, where it was chosen "The Sorcerer'southward Rock."

And then every scene that featured the phrase "philosopher'south stone" either spoken or written therefore had to be shot twice — once with the actors saying "philosopher's stone" and in one case with them maxim "sorcerer's stone."

Watch the beneath video for a comparison betwixt the United kingdom of great britain and northern ireland and the U.s. versions:

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