I’m a horseman now, whereas I was just a rider before. I’ve got a whole load of new friends, and I fell in love with New Zealand. As far as work is concerned, I have no idea. The jury is still out on that one.
How much of your character came from the books, and how much from Peter Jackson?
We used the books. We made this film from the book. We kept referring back to it. The moment we’d get lost we’d go, “I need to get back to the book and find out where we were supposed to be.” There’s lots of stuff in the book you could never film. The path of the characters development quite often is not referred to in the script. You have to go and find out yourself in the book. The script kind of leaps forward. You always have the book as a fair reference. We developed the characters from the very kind of basic script, which had very little dialogue in it. It’s quite frightening when you get a script that says, “Do you want to do this job?” And there’s no evidence of your character in the script. I came out on an act of faith, as they say.
Does that mean they were rewriting a lot on the set?
No, there was very little rewriting on the set. In fact, it was barely rewritten on the set. It was written beforehand. We changed little things on the set because the writing process was such a kind of carefully worked thing. If you got on the set and Pete had changed everything, you would have chaos because there were scenes that followed the scenes that hadn’t been written. There were scenes that preceded the scenes that we were doing that hadn’t been written. If he started changing the scenes that we were filming, you were going to get lost.
We finessed or changed them a little bit, but only after we’d spoken to Fran [Walsh] and Phillippa [Boyens]. We went for script conferences and came up with ideas, and worked things out. The role was developed with Phillipa and Fran. They were great sessions. I loved every one of them. We’d go and work out the way you think your character should go, what you think the scene should contain. That doesn’t happen on many films. You don’t get that kind of input in that early of a stage.
Is it strange to continue to do press for this set of films year after year?
Not really, no. They are different films. We see them as different films. We see them as different films that need promoting. Well, they don’t need promoting anymore but we’re very happy to come and do it because we’re all quite high on it. We’re all still very enthusiastic about the whole project. I think by and large we all love the work, we all loved doing it. I think we’re very proud of what we achieved. The final product is something we’re all real proud of. Quite personally, I’d do all this willingly without any problems whatsoever. I’m very happy to do it.
How would you rate the emotional investment in these films, compared to other movies you’ve been involved in?
This drew me in more than I’ve ever been drawn into a movie before. I don’t know. It wasn’t like being drawn in, I was actually running in (laughing). I was very willingly going in the same direction as they wanted me to go anyway.
The whole thing was a very spiritual experience, mainly because of New Zealand and what New Zealand meant - and what it means to all of us still. It was very difficult leaving New Zealand every time I had to leave it. It was the hardest thing about the whole project really, was leaving New Zealand. Leaving New Zealand the other day after having that amazing parade and the premiere and the party and stuff, and then having to get up the next day and pack was really, really difficult. Because for the first time, and it applied to all of us, for the very first time in God knows how many years – four years or whatever – we were leaving New Zealand and we didn’t know if we’d ever be back. The chances are we will go back, we will go back individually. But we’ll never be back on “Lord of the Rings.” Every other visit up to this one we thought, “Oh well, we’ll have reshoots.” Then it was, “Well, we’ve got to come do press.” Then at the end of the press junket we said, “Well actually, there is nothing else.”
PAGE 2: Action Scenes and Becoming a Better Horseman
Additional “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King” Press Junket Interviews:
Viggo Mortensen, Sean Astin, John Rhys-Davies, David Wenham/John Noble, and Richard Taylor/Barrie M. Osborne
“The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King” Premiere Coverage:
Orlando Bloom/Liv Tyler, Viggo Mortensen, Elijah Wood/Ian McKellen, Dominic Monaghan, David Wenham/John Noble, John Rhys Davies/Bernard Hill, and Peter Jackson/Richard Taylor
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES:
"Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King” Photo Gallery
"Return of the King” Trailer, Credits, Soundtrack Info and Movie News
