Sir Peter Jackson met with Economic Development Minister Gerry Brownlee this morning to discuss the future of his Lord of the Rings prequel, The Hobbit. Sir Peter, accompanied by his wife Fran Walsh, talked with Mr Brownlee in a closed meeting inside the Minister’s office. 3 News understands an announcement on the film will be made by the end of the week. The future of The Hobbit has been thrown into disarray following a highly-publicised spat between Mr Jackson and an Australian actors union. More..
Category: New Zealand
Story developing: A studio that helped make some of Wellington’s most famous films is on fire in Wellington. A huge fire at Portsmouth Miniatures Studio broke out at 3.10pm. A pall of smoke can be seen all over the eastern suburbs, rising from the building, near Wellington Airport.
The studio’s manager said she was on her way to the scene. No-one was hurt, she said. ”And that’s the main thing.” Crews from all around the Wellington region have gone to fight the blaze. Portsmouth Miniatures Studio has had a hand in many Wellington films. Its facilities were used during the making of Peter Jackson movies including King Kong and the Lord Of The Rings trilogy.
Update from tvnz.co.nz: It is believed to be the Rongotai studio where he films miniatures, located behind the Kilbirnie Fire Station.
Fire burns a Wellington studio owned by Sir Peter Jackson. – Source: Picture supplied by Matt Kovesdi
Seven global actors’ unions have instructed their members to walk away from roles in the two big-budget Lord of the Rings prequels because producers have allegedly refused to negotiate a deal guaranteeing wages and working conditions for performers in New Zealand. Unions in the US, Australia, the UK and Canada, acting under the umbrella of the International Federation of Actors (FIA), said Kiwi performers had “struggled on non-union contracts” for some years during filming of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. They said the contracts “provide no minimum guarantees of wages or working conditions”, no payment for future broadcasts and no cancellation payments. More..
Howard Shore’s The Lord of the Rings soundtrack has taken the top spot on UK’s Classic FM’s top 100 movie music chart. Thanks to Ringer Diztek for sending us the link. For the full list, jump over to Classic FM. [Top 100 MovieMusic] [LOTR Top Spot]
Our pal and LOTR star Bruce Hopkins writes: I interviewed Dirk Bartholoma who created and runs the LOTR conventions, RingCon and FedCon in Germany. I also talked with Donna Maloney a long time LOTR enthusiast. Donna was at DragonCon when we had our chat. I also have some interviews I did with people on the first night after the 7.1 earthquake that hit Christchurch last week. The link to these audio clips is here. There are a number of clips up so folks can click through to other pages as they will only see 5 at a time on the home page.
The Embassy Theatre and Weta Workshop are staging a District 9 fan event on October 8. Coinciding with the release of book The Art of District 9: Weta Workshop, the event will showcase props and guns from the movie and allow fans to take a photo with one of the weapons in their own hands. There will also be a behind-the-scenes presentation by Weta Workshop conceptual artists who worked on the film, followed by a screening of the movie at The Embassy Theatre. More..