The Lord Of The Rings star is to revive his role as the fantasy creature in prequel The Hobbit and despite the hard work involved in playing the part-computer generated character, he is looking forward to it. Andy said: “In 2010, if all goes according to plan, I think they’re gonna start thinking about The Hobbit. “It will be nice to drag Gollum kicking and screaming back out again. It will be great.” The 44-year-old British actor was speaking at the royal premiere of A Bunch Of Amateurs where he had been invited to give the Loyal Address to The Queen. Andy said: “I got asked because my wife Lorraine Ashbourne is in the film so I have to welcome the Royal family and introduce the film.” Andy Serkis eager for Gollum return

Claire writes: UK residents can see Andy Serkis on TV on Saturday 22nd November, on BBC2. He’s playing Albert Einstein, while David Tennant (the present Doctor Who) plays British scientist Arthur Eddington, in the film ‘Einsten and Eddington’. Details of the schedule are here and the BBC’s press notice is here. For those who miss the broadcast on the 22nd, the film may be available on BBC iPlayer for seven days after that date. And as the film is a co-production with HBO, I would expect it to be shown in the USA, though I can’t see anything about it on the HBO website at the moment.

According to a short video interview with Andy on ITN here, Andy Serkis is looking forward to reprising his role as Gollum:

Female Reporter: Was it very exhaustive being Gollum?

Andy: Yeah, yeah. It was physically very tiring. Physically and mentally and vocally. (laughs)

Male reporter: Being Smeagol, you being Smeagol as well – as an actor, that must be quite nice – to look like you, for once..

Andy: Well the fact of the matter is that I don’t know where they’re going to pick up the story – obviously Gollum in The Hobbit is Gollum – he has transformed into Gollum, so – but then there’s the prequel to The Rings as well, so we’ll have to see. It will be very, very interesting to see where the writing takes the development of the character. But I know they’ll come up with something very interesting.

We’re sure they will too, Andy.

Gollum / SmeagolThere is a great article posted at IGN today that summarizes what we already knew about Guillermo del Toro’s intention to use more animatronics in the creation of the ‘Hobbit’ films. But Ringer Elven points out one small bit of information of which we did not have previous confirmation:

We naturally enquired if he planned on continuing with a CG Gollum: “Absolutely. I think that it worked perfectly on the [Lord of the Rings] trilogy and if it ain’t broke, why fix it?”

Gotta love the ‘Why fix it?’ attitude! Read the full article and discuss in our forums! [IGN]

Andy SerkisMessage board member Dive Twin found an interesting article from Kent News in which Andy Serkis said he’s very keen to reprise his role as Gollum:

“Nothing is signed and sealed,” he said. “Gollum and Gandalf are in The Hobbit and whoever says I am in it for sure is assuming it has all been done and dusted. “But you never know in this industry. It would be fantastic to play Gollum again. He is a wonderful character and I enjoyed playing him in the Lord of the Rings. There’s more to be got out of him and more fun to be had.”

We think it would be fantastic for you to play Gollum again too, Andy! Read More

Christian Rivers and Peter Jackson

Peter Jackson has finished filming The Lovely Bones, and is now moving on to producing the first Tintin film as well as The Dambusters.

Actor Andy Serkis, who will play Captain Haddock in the Tintin films, told BBC radio that filming will begin in September in Los Angeles, with Spielberg as director and Jackson as producer. Serkis, best known for Gollum in The Lord of the Rings, said Jackson will direct the second Tintin adventure, and Jackson and Spielberg may jointly direct the third.

Read the full story at stuff.co.nz.