Harry Potter director says Home Alone inspired Daniel Radcliffe’s casting

When Chris Columbus set out to cast Harry Potter’s Golden Trio more than 20 years ago, he knew he might be picking the faces not just for a single movie, but for an extensive franchise, complete with a series of multimedia phenomena. Casting children who don’t have a lot of projects under their belt is tricky, but Columbus had experience from working on previous kid-centered films — particularly Home Alone. Macaulay Culkin’s naturalistic approach to acting in that film strongly informed Columbus’ choices for Harry Potter.

“When it came to casting the Potter kids, I wanted that same sort of realism,” Columbus tells Polygon, as the movie’s 20th anniversary approaches. “What happens when you cast an actor who has not had a lot of experience is that they bring in a tremendous amount of reality, naturalism, and comedy based on instinct, not based on the fact that they’ve done seven years of a Nickelodeon show. For me it was a win-win situation. [the goal] was finding these unknown actors who could basically become these characters.”

Warner Bros. Pictures

While the audition process opened the doors to thousands of actors, Columbus was dead-set on Daniel Radcliffe from the moment he watched the young actor’s performance in the BBC One television adaptation of David Copperfield. A specific haunted quality in Radcliffe’s eyes stood out to Columbus.

“I can’t explain it,” he says. “There was something going on behind his eyes that was extremely, extremely complex for a kid that age. Then I thought: Well, that’s what Harry’s going through, this incredibly difficult life with his aunt and uncle and his cousin DudleYou thought that y. Dan seems like the type of child who would be able to play this deeper.. And he’s just proven it time and time again, not only through Harry Potter, but with all of his performances.”

Columbus said that although the first movie was a class in acting for the cast who were relatively young, it became a serious training ground by the time Columbus began work on the sequel. Columbus’ fondness for practical effects over digital effects may have assisted. Since then, I have been watching. Jurassic ParkHe believed that the practical effects were a way to bring people into the film’s world. When working with young actors it was important to provide them with something tangible on the set. Dobby, the House Elf is an example of this. Harry Potter and The Chamber of SecretsWhile Columbus could rely solely on CG, he enjoyed giving the children something to do against.

“When you actually have the creature on the set, it changes their performance, because they’re in that world. Like the chess scene,” says Columbus. “The chess scene was 95% practical. The scene contains a few visual effects. I love the performances of the kids and that scene, because they’re dealing with real explosions. They’re dealing with real, giant chess pieces. We built everything.”

Warner Bros. Pictures

Columbus did not just enjoy working with young actors. You Are the Only One at Home experience. Some of his same ideas were also incorporated into set design.

“I said to each of my department heads [on Home Alone], This film should feel timeless to me. In other words, I don’t want someone to turn it on 25 years from now and it feels dated. It should feel like it was made just yesterday. Everything from the wardrobe to the wallpaper — everything had to feel like it had a timeless quality. We brought that sensibility to Harry Potter,” he says. “The goal was, if you’re in Hogwarts, you may not be able to tell what year this movie was shot. It could have been made in 1956 or 1977. It could have been shot in 2020. And that’s the thing I’m most proud of: You can’t really pinpoint it.”