Random Delightful Stories About Alan Rickman From Other Actors And Crew On Set (12 items)

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  (#4) When A Child With Cancer Visited The 'Harry Potter' Set, Rickman Got Him A Role

  Paula DuPré Pesmen produced the first three Harry Potter movies. She remembered how Rickman not only welcomed a child with advanced cancer to the set of Prisoner of Azkaban, but also made sure the boy had a small part in the movie.

  Of the experience with Rickman, DuPré Pesman told the Huffington Post: 

  Alan [kind] of went into his Snape-mode in costume, and said, 'Why isn’t this child in the film?' Everyone had a good laugh, and Alan took him by the hand and put him into the crowd of kids as they were panning across. The back of him is actually in a shot.
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  (#3) He Regularly Invited Kids To The 'Harry Potter' Set

  Evanna Lynch, who played Luna Lovegood in the Harry Potter films, remembered how Rickman's big heart was seemingly at odds with his serious reputation and his infamous stern appearance. His softer side was evident in some of his actions regarding guests he invited to the set. 

  Of this lesser-known side of Rickman, Lynch told Entertainment Weekly:

  Alan was a Method actor, so we were all pretty much terrified of him on set... But the memory that sticks out to me was we were allowed to bring guests [to the set]... Alan Rickman, pretty much every day of filming, he had a whole troop of little children [visiting]. It was the most bizarre scene to see Snape in this black robe... surrounded by all these happy little children who were just chatting away to him.
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  (#11) He Posed For A Photo In His Codpiece During The Filming Of 'Dogma'

  In Kevin Smith's Dogma, Rickman portrayed the "Voice of God." The codpiece Rickman wore to represent his genderless character amused him. Subsequently, Rickman humorously posed for a photo wearing the same prosthetic as his character in the movie. 

  After Rickman passed, Smith posted the story to his Facebook page, writing: 

  Alan was the first non-friend who signed up to the flick, but he became a great friend in record time. In this pic, he holds the Ken doll his Dogma character's lack of genitalia was modeled after. I'll never forget his incredible dulcet tones guffawing at the rubber crotch makeup he was wearing: one of the greatest actors who ever lived, tickled by a cinematic lack of a d*ck.
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  (#1) He Protested When The Crew Of 'Rasputin' Didn't Get A Decent Lunch

  Rickman won a Golden Globe for his performance in the 1996 telefilm Rasputin: Dark Servant of Destiny. During filming, Rickman was anything but a dark servant. As costar Ian McKellan, who played Tsar Nicholas II, remembered in a Facebook post, "He discovered that the local Russian crew was getting an even worse lunch than the rest of us. So he successfully protested."

  Rickman also stood up for McKellan, who was reportedly being picked on by the director during filming. As McKellan recalled:

  On my first day before the camera, he didn't like the patronizing, bullying tone of a note which the director gave me. Alan, seeing I was a little crestfallen, delivered a quiet, concise resume of my career and loudly demanded that the director up his game.
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  (#8) While Directing Kate Winslet, He Changed An Entire Scene At Her Request

  Rickman was also a director; his film credits include the Emma Thompson-led ensemble drama The Winter Guest and A Little Chaos starring Kate Winslet. Winslet revealed that during the filming of the latter, Rickman listened to her as an actor and was willing to change an entire scene because it didn't make sense to her.

  Winslet's character was supposed to destroy her garden as an act of self-loathing, a move the actress questioned. Rickman told the Los Angeles Times, "I sat in a chair and found a little corner. I thought, 'She is right to ask the question.'"

  According to Winslet, "He changed it all. He changed the set to accommodate the idea. He was amazing like that."
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  (#10) While Filming 'Something The Lord Made,' He Visited The American Visionary Art Museum

  Author Katie McCabe, who wrote the book on which Rickman's 2004 film, Something the Lord Made, was based, remembered how Rickman was significantly affected by a visit to the American Visionary Art Museum during filming. The museum features art made by trauma survivors.

  McCabe wrote about Rickman's experience with art on Jack Klimpert's blog:

  Rickman clearly knew art, and loved it, maybe more than he did theater, he said, because that’s where he’d started, at art school, when he was 18. What moved me was his feeling about these anonymous artists who had created out of their pain. He seemed to be talking about himself.

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