Harris was a longtime alcoholic until he became a teetotaler in 1981, although he did resume drinking Guinness a decade later. He gave up drugs after almost dying from a cocaine overdose in 1978. A memorable incident concerning his massive alcohol consumption was an appearance on The Late Late Show where he recounted to host Gay Byrne how he had just polished off two bottles of fine wine in a restaurant and decided that he would then be going on the wagon: "And I looked at my watch and it was... Well isn't that spooky! It was the same time it is now: 11:20!"
Harris is also attributed with an anecdote in which he was found lying drunk in a street in London. A passing policeman asked him what he was doing, and he replied that the world was spinning. The policeman inquired as to how lying in the street was going to help, and he said, "I'm waiting for my house to go by." In a 1994 appearance on The Late Show with David Letterman, Harris said he had his driver's license permanently suspended for knocking over a double-decker bus in Dublin, Ireland.
Harris died of Hodgkin's Lymphoma on 25 October 2002, aged 72, two and a half weeks before the American premiere of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. Harris was a lifelong friend of actor Peter O'Toole, and his family reportedly hoped that O'Toole would replace Harris as Dumbledore in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. There were, however, worries of insuring O'Toole for the five remaining films in the series, and he was ultimately replaced as Dumbledore by the Irish-born actor Sir Michael Gambon.
For years, whenever he was in London, Harris resided at the Savoy Hotel. According to the hotel archivist Susan Scott, as Harris was being taken from the hotel on a stretcher, shortly before his death, he warned the diners, "It was the food!"
Harris's remains were cremated, and his ashes were scattered in The Bahamas, where he had owned a home.
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