He was perhaps best known to audiences for his cold performances as Severus Snape in the Harry Potter franchise and villainous Hans Gruber in Die Hard.

But Alan Rickman could have found himself playing a very different role in the form of a bumbling Englishman after he was earmarked by Richard Curtis to play the lead in Four Weddings and a Funeral.

Curtis said Hugh Grant was not his first choice for the 1994 romantic comedy revealing he found him to be “annoying, too good-looking and a bit posh”.

But the Love Actually writer was overruled by the film’s director Mike Newell who wanted Grant for the role.

The pair were working together to bring Curtis’s screenplay to life following the story of unlucky-in-love Charles who famously falls in love with Andie MacDowell.

“We auditioned about 70 people for Hugh’s part. Eventually it was down to Hugh and Alan Rickman. I went for Alan but I was outvoted,” he said.

“I just thought Hugh was a bit annoying, too good-looking and a bit posh. I was right about all of those things but he was also very good,” Curtis told an audience at the Cheltenham Literary Festival.

The About Time director was interviewed by his daughter feminist campaigner Scarlett Curtis at the ten-day event on Saturday night.