Fans of the Lord of the Rings film know that of the three screenwriters, Fran Walsh is the one who avoids interviews and other sorts of publicity. When I was doing my research for The Frodo Franchise, I managed to talk with Peter and Philippa, but not Fran, who sent word that she was too wrapped up in working on King Kong to think back to her previous project. Fair enough, as Bilbo says in agreeing to a certain riddling game. Still, fans of the trilogy can’t help but be intrigued by this talented lady. After all, she not only helped write the LOTR scripts, but she did some directing and came up with the idea for the famous “Gollum talks to himself” scene.
But yesterday the New York Times published a substantial piece on Ms Walsh, written by Brooks Barnes, who is obviously a lucky fellow. Last summer, he says, he “largely roamed without supervision” during a two-day visit to the Hobbit set–spotting, among other things, Ian McKellen in full Gandalf mode catching a snooze between scenes.
Even so, his eventual interview with Fran had to be done via long-distance telephone. Philippa chimed in as well, which makes sense, given how closely these two collaborate on the scripts. Very closely, in fact, since they reveal that they often work in bed together in their pajamas, surrounded by dogs! (When I interviewed Philippa, she was living next door to Fran and Peter, and I suppose she still does.) It saves the trouble of commuting the short distance to the Miramar filmmaking facilities.
Ringer Mr BBi managed to record cast interviews from yesterday off the satellite for channels 7 & 9 in Australia. Cast members interviewed include Martin Freeman, Richard Armitage, Hugo Weaving, Cate Blanchett, Elijah Wood, Sir Peter Jackson and Philippa Boyens. Most of the interviews are a respectable 4-5 minutes each. Check them out!
Philippa Boyens. Photo: KENT BLECHYNDEN/Fairfax NZ Wellington’s Philippa Boyens is one of the most successful screenwriters in the world. She’s won an Oscar, a Bafta and has been a nominee for many more, including a Writers Guild of America Award.
Boyens owes much of this to her screenwriting debut with Sir Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings. She went on to co-write King Kong and The Lovely Bones with Jackson and Fran Walsh, as well as co-produce both films.
So with the fruits of her most recent labour, the US$500 million trilogy The Hobbit, soon to be revealed to the world with the release in December of An Unexpected Journey, we’d be forgiven for assuming Boyens was keen from the very beginning to return to Middle-earth.
When asked, there’s a long pause before she answers. “I loved the world. I loved [JRR] Tolkien’s writing. [But] I think there was a quality about myself where I felt like ‘I’d done it’,” she says while in Wellington.
Australians Cate Blanchett, Hugo Weaving and Barry Humphries will all attend the world premiere of the first Hobbit movie in New Zealand next week.
Warner Bros. has announced the stars who will attend the first screening of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, in Wellington.
Filmmakers Sir Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens will also be joined by Martin Freeman, who plays the central role of Bilbo Baggins; Richard Armitage, who stars as the dwarf warrior Thorin Oakenshield; Andy Serkis who plays Gollum and Elijah Wood who plays Frodo Baggins.
There may be a nearly 10-metre statue of Gandalf the Grey above Wellington’s Embassy Theatre, but the actor who plays the character, Sir Ian McKellen, won’t be there to see it for himself.
McKellen said he was sorry he could not attend. “I know they (the cast) will have a wonderful welcome from the fans and I envy them. As ever, my heart is in Wellington, and I send my love.”
Some fans have expressed concern that Peter Jackson melding The Hobbit with Tolkien’s later, weightier work will rob the former of its light spirit. Might it lose its intimate tone?
Seventeen years have passed since Peter Jackson approached Miramax about bringing one of his favorite JRR Tolkien tales The Hobbit to the big screen.
Speaking to the Dominion Post‘s Lenna Tailor Peter Jackson and Philippa Boyens speculate that the delay, during which they went on to shoot three wildly successful movies based on Tolkien Lord of the Rings, might have been for the best.
Jackson: “I remember in 1995 I made the first call to [Miramax’s] Harvey Weinstein and said we were interested in doing The Hobbit. The idea was, if it was successful, we would do Lord of the Rings. But Harvey said the rights were in a very complicated state — however, Lord of the Rings was potentially available. It’s strange how that call 17 years ago was the beginning of this whole process.”
“It was fate that we did Lord of the Rings first because it has made for a better Hobbit,” adds writer-producer Philippa Boyens. “It would’ve been a very different film if we’d gone the other way around. Maybe fate was also waiting for Martin [Freeman] to play Bilbo at exactly the right time and age.”
Fans of the Lord of the Rings film know that of the three screenwriters, Fran Walsh is the one who avoids interviews and other sorts of publicity. When I was doing my research for The Frodo Franchise, I managed to talk with Peter and Philippa, but not Fran, who sent word that she was too wrapped up in working on King Kong to think back to her previous project. Fair enough, as Bilbo says in agreeing to a certain riddling game. Still, fans of the trilogy can’t help but be intrigued by this talented lady. After all, she not only helped write the LOTR scripts, but she did some directing and came up with the idea for the famous “Gollum talks to himself” scene.
