The ever-vigilant Tiggy happened to record TVOne’s Susan Wood interviewing Craig Parker, who’s playing Haldir in LOTR. It’s a bit incoherent, as real conversations often are, and it’s clear he was avoiding saying too much. Another source tells me that in the movie Haldir accompanies Arwen wherever she goes,so the role isn’t as small as all that.
Thursday 17/8 (last week.)
SUSAN So you’re a tall elf, a six foot elf ?
CRAIG Yes, I’m probably five eleven or five ten probably if I’m honest…
I stand on blocks. The elves are about six (foot).
SUSAN Are the blocks attached to your shoes?
CRAIG We tried that on the first day of shooting for a big wide shot and I taped
polystyrene to my feet but that didn’t work – I fell over. It’s magic – it’s all done with smoke and mirrors.
SUSAN You see the likes of Tom Cruise out of Hollywood and you know he’s little.
CRAIG Yes …
SUSAN Nicole towers over him. So how do you do it?
CRAIG We’ve all sworn a blood oath to secrecy honest, but there’s a lot of very complicated scale doubling and some fantastic actors who are about this size (indicates short) who they used in some shots – all magic stuff…sometimes the shots are forced, sometimes not.
SUSAN So it’s all trickery!
CRAIG Confuses the hell out of me!
SUSAN All trickery and confusion!
CRAIG All trickery and confusion, yeah !
SUSAN What sort of explosion[sic] did it give you ?
CRAIG I think the film is going to be fantastic. I have a smallish part in it that goes for ……cool stuff…….but I’m not moving to Hollywood or anything like that but it’s great fun. I think in NZ we get to work on a lot of interesting things and for me the joy in it for me is just being there and doing it
