VIDEO: Watch Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, and Rupert Grint in their first ‘Harry Potter’ screen test

Even in this shaky and clearly nervewracking screen test for the first "Harry Potter" film, Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, and Rupert Grint had palpable on-screen chemistry. That chemistry helped spawn eight films and an incredible $7.7 billion in box office receipts.

According to the clapperboard seen in the video, the screen test was shot in Aug. 9, 2000 -- just before they were officially announced as the stars of the "Harry Potter" films. The three young actors play through a scene from “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” in which their characters learn about the titular stone created by mysterious Nicolas Flamel. Diehard “Potter” fans will notice that the actors refer to it as the Sorcerer’s Stone and not the Philosopher's Stone, as they do in the film.

How did they get the parts?
Out of the three young actors, Radcliffe was the most experienced. He’d previously starred as young David Copperfield in the BBC’s 1999 adaptation of the Charles Dickens story of the same name, and had a supporting role in the 2001 thriller “The Tailor of Panama.” “Potter” producer David Heyman saw Radcliffe in the audience at a theatre and knew he’d found his Harry, eventually convincing the young actor’s parents to allow him to audition.

As for Watson and Grint, they were complete unknowns whose only previous acting experience had been in school plays. During the exhaustive seven-month search, they auditioned along with thousands of other children and were selected for their respective roles.

This 2000 screen test is a far cry from where these former child stars now find themselves. In an effort to escape the roles that made them famous, the three young actors have all taken on parts quite unlike Harry, Hermoine, and Ron in the years since the "Potter" series ended.

Radcliffe has played a lawyer in the horror film "The Woman in Black," beat era poet Allen Ginsberg in "Kill Your Darlings," and a love-lorn Torontonian in the upcoming "The F Word." Watson was most recently seen in Darren Aronofsky's Biblical epic "Noah" opposite Russell Crowe and Jennifer Connelly, and Sophia Coppola's scathing critique of celebrity culture "The Bling Ring." And Grint recently played real-life punk rocker Cheetah Chrome in the 2013 rock drama "CBGB."

Radcliffe, Watson, and Grint will always be associated with their "Harry Potter" roles, but this screen test and the roles they've taken on post-"Potter" prove that the trio has the talent to do anything they want in the future.