Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Pt. II (Dir. David Yates)

“Craig says that the sets often required a more “theatrical, operatic” scale than the book described, although they were as faithful as possible to Rowling’s intricate descriptions. The only serious departure, Craig says, was the location of Professor Snape’s (Alan Rickman) death. In the book, he dies in the Shrieking Shack; in the film, he dies in a boathouse that resembles a Gothic sanctuary. “We did ask Jo Rowling if we might [change] that. She absolutely agreed that we could,” he says. Craig made the boathouse of “90 percent glass, and the reason for that was that it seemed magical that Hogwarts was on fire above it—or big sections of it—and there was a sense of the flame from the fire above being reflected in the glass, also reflected in the water, which in turn reflected in the glass.” The team wanted to give Rickman “a suitable place to die. Alan appreciated it, actually, and said so very kindly afterwards,” Craig says.”

- Vanity Fair interview with Harry Potter production designer Stuart Craig