TheOneRing.net is set to invade Dragon*Con , the world’s largest Sci-Fi/Pop Culture convention, this Labor Day weekend (August 31st – September 3rd) in Atlanta, Georgia.

This years LotR/Hobbit guests include Billy Boyd, John Rhys-Davies, Craig Parker, and Sylvester McCoy.

Meet up with other Tolkien fans at the annual Evening at Bree event on Friday August 31st, hosted by Tolkien’s Middle-earth Track with music by Emerald Rose and a costume contest MC’d by Craig Parker.     The Tolkien Track will also host fan film screenings,  costuming panels,  scholarly discussions, even open mic nights!   Stop by TOR.n’s fan table to pick up a TOR.n t-shirt and try your hand at Tolkien trivia.     And of course TOR.n staffers will be on hand to discuss all the latest information on ‘The Hobbit’ films.

For a complete list of Tolkien Track panels, click here.

 

 

Radio NZ National program The Arts on Sunday has interviewed Peter King who is the brains behind the make up design for the Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.

King has previously won an Oscar and a BAFTA for his work on The Lord of the Rings, while his other film credits include Nine, the Nanny McPhee movies, King Kong, Thunderbirds and An Ideal Husband.

I don’t know how long the link will remain up so you should have a listen soon. Press play below to hear the interview.

If the above link doesn’t work for you listen [here]

Today, Weta Workshop put up their most detailed environment yet. The Barad-Dur: Fortress of Sauron has gone up for order and after seeing this at Comic-Con just last month this is something fans will want to make sure to figure out how to get into their collection. Barad-Dur took the team at Weta over 1,500 hours to complete and when you get a chance to see this you will be able to see why.

This environment is a perfect rendering of what was on screen and will take you right to the moment we first saw Barad-Dur on screen. Barad-Dur comes in with a price tag of $699.99 and an edition size of only 1,000 pieces world wide which are sure to sell quickly.

You do have time to save though as this environment will not be shipping until December this year or next January.

[Pre-order your Barad-Dur]

For most Olympians, wearing the colors of there country is enough, but for others an ink gun provides the opportunity to express themselves in a more permanent way.

It seems that Karine Sergerie, a member of the Canadian taekwondo team heading to the 2012 London Olympics is a Lord of the Rings fan, sporting a quote from Gandalf in The Fellowship Of The Ring  as tattoo on her forearm from that reads “All we have to do is decide what to do with the time given to us.” now that’s a good mantra to go by!

Thanks to ringer spy Pearl Sandybanks for the spot. [look!] for full size.

This Saturday (August 4) at 10.30am, Billy Boyd will narrate the story behind the first ever stage production of of J.R.R.Tolkien’s The Hobbit on BBC Radio 4.

The very first stage production, written by Humphrey Carpenter with music composed by Paul Drayton, was performed at New College School in Oxford in 1967.

Some of the choristers in that first production are now eminent in the musical world: choral conductor Simon Halsey, Opera North’s Martin Pickard and artist’s agent Stephen Lumsden. Composer Howard Goodall watched his older brother Ashley perform. They talk about their memories and of Tolkien’s presence in the audience on the last night.

Thanks to Ringer Andrew for the heads-up.

Update: Ringer HuanCry adds that Radio 4 is also broadcasting a documentary Tolkien in Love the day before.

[Billy Boyd and the Hobbit] | [Tolkien in Love]

After a successful run in Washington DC last year Andrew Upton, Cate Blanchett and Richard Roxburgh have brought the Sydney Theater Company’s production of the famous Chekhov play Uncle Vanya to New York City. And it’s wowing audiences in the Big Apple.

Opening as a part of the Lincoln Centre Festival at the weekend, critics have praised the “uniformly brilliant cast” that includes Cate Blanchett and Hugo Weaving.

Cate Blanchett and Richard Roxburgh are still slightly terrified by the play ‘It’s excruciating,’ says Blanchett. ‘What I find the most difficult thing to exist within is what Tamas [Ascher, the Hungarian director] describes in Chekhov as the “stupid silences” where everyone just falls into a silence that is utterly stupid, and their stupidity is revealed to them, and they are staring into a void.’ The production continues at the New York City Centre until Saturday.

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