11 things
Bringing J.R.R. Tolkien's epic trilogy, The Lord of the Rings, to the big screen is unquestionably one of the largest projects undertaken in movie history -- and perhaps the greatest business venture ever mounted on New Zealand soil. Kiwi director Peter Jackson (Heavenly Creatures, The Frighteners) pushed to make three films back to back based on Tolkien's masterpiece, which depicts an epic battle between the good folk of the Fellowship, including Hobbits, Dwarves and the Races of Men, and the evil armies of the dark lord, Sauron, for control of the "one ring" that gives ultimate power over all.
From this rich source, we have endeavored to unearth a Shire-ful of wondrous but little-known facts about the making of The Lord of the Rings.
1. Middle-Earth is Real.
The fantastic realm where the LOTR story is set is in fact an area in Birmingham, England. As a child, J.R.R. Tolkien loved to play in the area around Sarehole Mill, now known as Moseley. Later, he immortalized his beloved childhood haunts in his novels The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. But Tolkien's landscapes may have met their match in the rugged New Zealand countryside. "It's one of the most beautiful places on the face of the Earth," says actor Sean Astin, who plays the Hobbit Sam Gamgee, sidekick to Frodo (Elijah Wood), the hero of the story. "It was like Tolkien walked across New Zealand and then sat down to start writing."
2. The Auditions Were Cutthroat.
Getting these coveted parts posed a tough task for the actors: Astin was forced to gain 30 pounds before Jackson would hire him. When Elijah Wood heard that LOTR was casting, "he made his own videotape where he dressed up in costume and read Frodo's monologues from the books and sent it to Peter," says Unit Publicist Claire Cooper.
3. Making Grown Men Look 3'6" is Easier Than You Think.
Transforming normal-sized actors Ian Holm, Elijah Wood, Sean Astin, Dominic Monaghan and Billy Boyd into, respectively, the 3'6" Hobbits Bilbo, Frodo, Sam Gamgee, Merry and Pippin, and the towering John Rhys-Davies into Gimli the dwarf demanded a blending of ancient trickery and the newest digital techniques. "60 to 70 percent of those shots were done live on set," says visual effects supervisor Jim Rygiel. "Sometimes we puppeteered giant sets of legs past the Hobbit actors to make them appear small. We also used forced perspective to make it appear as though Bilbo was right across from [the human wizard] Gandalf [Ian McKellen], but actually he was 30 feet behind him. Since it's all set up from the same viewpoint in relation to the camera, Bilbo just looked smaller. That worked flawlessly." Other times the human and Hobbit actors performed separately against bluescreen, and the images were combined digitally.
4. The Numbers are Staggering.
According to makeup effects maestro (and co-founder of Weta effects house) Richard Taylor, creating the denizens of Middle Earth demanded 148 artisans in the Weta Workshop cranking out some 1500 handmade costumes, including 160 Orcs, 50 Goblins, 100 Uruk-hai (half orcs, half humans), plus 100 Elves, 100 Gondorians and 250 Rohans (which are breeds of human). Taylor's crew created 200 Orc masks, and, over the course of filming, made 10,000+ prosthetic make-up pieces needed to turn humans into Elves, Hobbits, Orcs, etc. The ovens where the foam rubber prosthetics were cooked ran 365 days a year, including Christmas and New Year's. 1800 pairs of hobbit feet were needed. 10 people worked for three years making wigs.
5. Making Chainmail Is a Major Pain.
Virtually every element of the production was handcrafted by artists. The Weta Workshop made 50,000 props, including swords, axes, shields and spears. Although the production had its own ironsmith, who crafted the original armor, the chainmail itself was made in a unique way. "Weta Workshop sliced PVC piping very thinly, then four dedicated people worked for about a year full time linking them together," says Cooper. "They linked over 12 million links to make all the chainmail, then they sprayed it with metallic paint and it looks real, but it was light and comfortable for the 500 actors we had on set in full armor."
6. Eat Your Heart Out, Star Wars.
During production, Jackson's crew, which consisted of 2400 people from all over the world, shot in over 100 locations and on 350 sets. The three films featured a whopping 77 speaking roles, and 26,660 extras were employed to fill out the epic battle scenes. "We were just like a huge travelling circus all the time," Cooper says. "Some days we had five to seven different photography units shooting at once. One day, we served 1460 eggs at the same place for breakfast! It was just so massive. When all our production vehicles were lined up, wherever we went, they were a mile long. We were just such a spectacle."
7. Tolkien's Made-Up Language.
There were two full-time dialect coaches on set teaching Elvish -- a language Tolkien invented. "Tolkien was a linguist and he invented several languages," Cooper says. "Elvish was based on the Finnish languages."
8. The Locals Gave Their Blessing.
Before the cameras started rolling on the Wellington set in New Zealand, elders from a local Maori tribe blessed the location. "There was a huge ceremony with the cast and crew," Astin remembers. "A couple thousand people stopped what they were doing, and on a converted soundstage, the Maori elders performed a ritual. They talked about the stewardship of the land, and hoped that the land would take good care of us, which I must say it did."
9. The Longest Shoot Since Apocalypse Now.
Principal photography, which has wrapped for all three films in the series, required an astounding 274 production shooting days. "I don't think I really conceptualized when I agreed to do fifteen months what that really meant," Astin says. "It was two birthdays for my daughter [who makes her acting debut in LOTR as a Hobbit]."
10. Identical Tattoos: A Great Way to Bond.
Because of the intense working relationship, the Fellowship of the Ring cast members bonded to an unusual degree. "The only thing I can compare it to is how close people become in the military," says Astin. "We were always hanging out together in town. We all took up surfing together. And at the end, we all got a matching tattoo -- in Elf script it says, 'The Nine.' Everyone got them in different places. Mine's on my ankle -- the Hobbit foot -- because Billy Boyd, who plays Pippin, got his on his ankle and I thought it was very appropriate given that we were Hobbits."
11. One Actor, Two Decades of Reading.
Actor Christopher Lee, who will turn 80 in May, and who plays Saruman, the evil wizard, had read The Lord of the Rings each year for the last 20 years before he was hired to be in the production. "Christopher Lee was definitely the most knowledgeable about Tolkien," says Cooper. "He would go into Weta Workshop, knowing a lot of the artists and sculptors working there were fanatics about the books, and he would quiz them with trivia questions from the books and they wouldn't know the answer. He's so classic in his delivery, and has that amazing deep voice, and he'd say, 'Come on now....'"
Ron Magid is a freelance writer based in Los Angeles. He has written for Premiere, Wired, and Entertainment Weekly. He's ashamed to admit he's only read the Lord of the Rings trilogy only once.
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