A faithful reader emailed us

A faithful reader emailed us this detailed, excellent piece of filming info. We hope more will follow in his path:

I have a copy of ‘Gloucestershire Today’, which has an article about the filming in Gloucester Cathedral in February. I have tried to scan the images in but have problems with my scanner, so if you want I can send you the article. This would obviously take some time because of the distance involved. You’d have to give me your address of course.

To be honest, my sister was actually involved in the filming, which took place from 5-8th February 2001. It’s actually quite bad that this article has been published because the extras were told not to say a word. But because it has been published I thought it would not do any harm if I told you what scenes were filmed in Gloucester.

The scenes filmed were the scenes where Percy leads the Gryffindor first years to the Fat Lady following the Sorting Ceremony. The scenes described in the article refer to those where Peeves throws walking sticks at the pupils en route to the Fat Lady’s portrait.

Rik Mayall was in Gloucester for the filming, though he did not film all the scenes with the pupils. He merely had to shout his lines in the cloisters of the Cathedral, so as to achieve the correct sound level for the scene. His body would later be added with special affects.

Chris Ratkin(Percy) was also in Gloucester.

The Fat Lady’s portrait was also sited in the cathedral ­ sort of at a right angle to a large door saying: ‘GIRLS’ on it. It can be assumed that this was either the entrance to Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom (although this would obviously not be relevant until: ‘Chamber of Secrets’) or perhaps to the girls dormitory. If you look on the last page of the article( as you will see once I send it to you) you can see a group of men pulling down an arch. This was where the door with: “GIRLS” was situated. Or if you follow this link you can see the west cloister at the end of which by turning right joins the north cloister. The ‘GIRLS’ door was at the end of this cloister.

If you follow this link you will see the north cloister it was at the very end of this cloister where the Fat Lady was situated ( where the wall is at the far end ). The portrait was as high as the roof of the cloisters and was merely a black and white outline of a stout looking women on a white card background. (Again, it seemed that the Fat Lady would be added as ‘special effects’.)

Several scenes of pupils wondering around corners and waiting in corridors were also filmed in the cloisters. Though the entire interior of the cathedral was out of bounds for five days, I can confirm that the cloisters were the only part of the Cathedral used. I can only confirm that Rik Mayall and John Hurt were present in Gloucester for the duration of the filming, though John Cleese was apparently seen in a car park.

Each of the main actors, (well certainly Harry, Ron, Hermione and Percy) had doubles. Indeed, the three younger stars had three doubles each, Percy by the looks of things only had one.

I tried to get a picture of Rik Mayall but the security men put their umbrellas up so there was no point. One thing I did not notice was a scar on Dan Radcliffe’s head, his hair was also quite tidy too. I suspect alot of he makeup work took place just before the cameras rolled on set.

Another thing I found out was that Emma Watson was really ill just before Christmas which delayed the filming by two weeks. She had to have a doctor on set with her at all times during this period. She attends the xxxxx School in xxxxx. [edited for privacy protection, July 26th]

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Hope this is of some use.

This is incredibly interesting news. It gives a lot more detail than what we learned from a recent Dark Horizon’s report. We learn that Rik Mayall is most definitely playing Peeves, that each actor has *3* doubles and some actors, at least 1. We find out more about Emma Watson’s illness, briefly touched upon in an interview with Zoe Wannamaker (Madame Hooch), and where Ms. Watson goes to school [edited for privacy protection, July 26th]. Also, Percy is played by Chris Rankin not Chris Ratkin.

Some of the more intriguing news includes the fact that John Hurt was on-site. Why would Hurt be there if he was playing Mr. Ollivander as recently professed? Could he be playing the Bloody Baron?