On Rowling's website, one of the Easter Eggs shows an alternate plotline for Book 1, where Harry's parents had apparently stolen the Philosopher's Stone, which partly explains why the Potters were so rich.
In the earliest draft of the first chapter, the Potters lived on an island, and Hermione's family, living on the mainland, saw an explosion out at sea and discovered the bodies of Harry's parents. In this version of the story, Hermione's father was the one who pulled Harry out of the wreckage of his parents' house. The house on an island idea eventually evolved into the hut on the rock that the Dursleys and Harry retreat to in Chapter 3.
Dean Thomas was originally going to be a cousin of Ron named Gary. He would've fulfilled much of the role that eventually went to Neville Longbottom, and would have been with the Trio and Neville when they found Fluffy. Furthermore, he was going to have his own subplot: his biological father was actually a wizard killed for refusing to join Voldemort, but Dean's mother just thought he abandoned her. This is briefly alluded to in Book 7, but Rowling abandoned most of this backstory in favor of developing Neville's, which ties in closer to Harry's story.
Draco's surname was originally going to be either Spungen, Smart or Spinks.
Originally, Rowling wanted the Sorting Hat to be a machine that "did all kinds of magical things before reaching a decision". When she decided that this idea was "too easy", she thought kids should be sorted by the ghosts of the four founders, which would exist inside statues that came alive in the entrance hall, picking children for their houses one-by-one. After that, she grappled with drawing straws, a team captain doing the picking, and pulling names from a hat, before finally deciding that the hat itself would decide the students' fate.
There was originally going to be a vampire teacher named Professor Trocar, after a sharp medical tool used to drain blood. Rowling did away with the idea, since the concept of vampires has been exploited so many times she felt there was little more she could add to the tradition.
An early draft had Rita Skeeter as one of the people that Harry meets when he comes into the Leaky Cauldron for the first time. At this point she was named 'Bridget' instead. She was cut because it was taking too long for Harry to get to Diagon Alley and because Rowling decided to focus on Harry's fame later in the series. J. K. Rowling later said that by the time Rita properly appeared, she was influenced heavily by the journalists she had encountered since her fame.
Scholastic, the American publisher, originally wanted to retitle the book as Harry Potter and the School of Magic, which can be seen in this early draft of the cover art◊.note The French had a similar idea, adapting the first book with the title of Harry Potter and the School of Wizards. Rowling rejected this, and they eventually settled on Sorcerer's Stone instead.
Steven Spielberg was attached to direct really early on. He wanted to make the film as an All-CGI Cartoon with Haley Joel Osment providing Harry's voice. Of course, Haley Joel Osment violated Rowling's stipulation that the cast be kept British and she also didn't like the idea of it being animated. Eventually, Spielberg left on his own, feeling that it would be like "shooting ducks in a barrel. It's just a slam-dunk. It's just like withdrawing a billion dollars and putting it into your personal bank accounts. There's no challenge." In a 2023 interview, Spielberg gave another reason, saying, "I chose to turn down the first Harry Potter to basically spend that next year and a half with my family, my young kids growing up. So I'd sacrificed a great franchise, which today looking back I'm very happy to have done, to be with my family."
Another person asked to direct the film? Baz Luhrmann.
Ron Howard was offered the chance to direct but turned it down because he had just directed How the Grinch Stole Christmas and didn't want to jump right into another difficult and expensive fantasy movie. He would direct A Beautiful Mind instead.
Sean Connery was offered the role of Dumbledore, but turned it down because he famously hated the fantasy genrenote This is mentioned in an installment of Saturday Night Live'sCelebrity Jeopardy! with the SNL version of Connery claiming he turned down Harry Potter just for the chance to harass Trebek again, having already passed on the roles of Gandalf and Morpheus beforehand. Patrick McGoohan was offered the role, but declined due to ill-health.
Tim Roth was cast as Snape, but he found scheduling problems with another role he was cast at the time, General Thade of Tim Burton's Planet of the Apes (2001) (the film includes future Potter cast member Helena Bonham Carter and was once thought to be directed by Chris Columbus). Although Roth was equally interested in both roles, he was forced to choose one at the end, and he went for Thade. Talk about a bad career choice...
David Thewlis, who would eventually join the franchise as Remus Lupin, either auditioned or was in consideration to play Professor Quirrell before Ian Hart was cast.
Robin Williams (for the role of Hagrid), Rosie O'Donnell (for Molly Weasley), and Drew Barrymore all expressed interest in starring in the film as they were fans of the books, but Rowling's insistence on an all-British cast shot this idea down quickly.
Richard Harris hadn't initially wanted to play Dumbledore, both because he knew his own health was in decline and for fear that the franchise (which he made no secret that he viewed as "made up crap") would overshadow the rest of his film career. He only took the role because his then 11-year-old granddaughter threatened never to speak to him again otherwise.
"Because, you see, I don't just want to be remembered for those bloody Potter films, and I'm afraid that's what's going to happen to me."
Hatty Jones, who played the live-action Madeline, was considered for the part of Hermione.
Writing and pre-production
The original costume test had Harry dressed as he was on Mary GrandPre's cover illustration for the first book, with a striped rugby shirt, jeans and sneakers under his robe. This looked "like a kid in a Halloween costume", hence the standard-issue modern British Muggle school uniforms under the robes at Hogwarts.
The initial plan was to film the movie on sound stages in Los Angeles, instead of exclusively in the UK. This actually caused Daniel Radcliffe's parents to initially refuse to let him audition for the film, as they didn't want to disrupt his life by making him travel to America.
Canterbury Cathedral was the first choice to be used as a set for Hogwarts. They refused, worried that the witchcraft theme of the series would upset Christians who worshipped there. Apparently, Gloucester Cathedral and Durham Cathedral had fewer hang-ups about this, as they were used as shooting locations for the film.
The Hogwarts Express was almost played by an entirely different engine, the West Country Class Southern Railways 21C127/British Railways 34207 ''Taw Valley'', a 4-6-2 Pacific. She had been painted in the Hogwarts livery and affixed with Hogwarts Express nameplates on the engine to promote the books, but when it came to choosing the locomotive for the film, Chris Columbus thought she looked too modern (she was built in 1946 before she was rebuilt in 1957 to more modern standards). The Great Western Railroad 4900 class 5972 ''Olton Hall'', was chosen in her stead (she was built in 1937 and never rebuilt to modern standards).
Thinking that Harry needed a sounding board in the scenes with the Dursleys, Steve Kloves decided to give him a pet spider named Alastair, as well as an army of broken toy soldiers. In the final film, the brief shot of Harry playing with toy soldiers is an artifact of this idea.
Early on, Meddling Executives pushed for one of the characters, usually Ron, to be made into a token American and/or for Harry to be written as more of a wisecracking smartass. These ideas didn't get far, as both Rowling and Kloves disliked them. There were also those at the start who suggested combining set pieces from different books into one movie rather than adapting each book individually.
During and after filming
Producers intended to match the characters' appearances with their descriptions in the book - giving Daniel Radcliffe green contacts and having Emma Watson wear buck teeth. Dan turned out to be in the minority of the population who are allergic to fake contacts and Emma couldn't talk properly with the teeth in, so those ideas were abandoned.
When Chris Columbus saw the first cut (before music was added), he thought the boats riding up to Hogwarts was a Leave the Camera Running scene which would have to be edited down. After Columbus saw the scene with the score John Williams had written for it, he realized that they had to keep the whole thing and they did.
The character of Peeves was originally going to be included in the film. Rik Mayall was cast and apparently went as far as filming scenes before the character was cut. None of the footage - if it exists - has ever been shown. The story is rather complicated and involves two more cases of What Could Have Been. Apparently, Chris Columbus and David Heyman hated the design of Peeves and basically filmed the scene with him knowing that it wouldn't be in the theatrical release, but planning to go back and "fix" it for a future special edition to be released in 2002 or 2003. Columbus was planning to introduce an all-CGI Peeves in Chamber and presumably this would have been the Peeves he was planning to go back and insert into the first film. Then Peeves didn't make the second film either and it seems they just gave up after that.
Ginny didn't have any lines in the script. According to Bonnie Wright, her saying "good luck" to Harry is something that Chris Columbus came up with on the day of filming.
The sequence of the Trio getting past Fluffy by way of Harry (and then Hermione) playing a flute to get him to sleep was hinted at in one draft of the script. Upon finding out that a harp is playing by itself, Harry holds the flute and comments "Suppose we won’t be needing this now". A press image actually depicts the scene. Ironically, this was an Orphaned Reference itself, as the script has no mention of Harry acquiring a flute (in the book, Hagrid gave it to him for Christmas).
In the shooting script, as in the original book, the "few words" that Dumbledore wants to say are, "nitwit, blubber, oddment, tweak," and his start-of-term notices occur later on, after Nearly Headless Nick's introduction. Furthermore, behind-the-scenes material makes it clear that the scene was shot this way, and it was changed around in editing.
◊.note Rowling rejected this, and they eventually settled on Sorcerer's Stone instead.
