As you might expect of anything connected to The Lord of the Rings, the numbers behind Howard Shore’s score for the Peter Jackson film trilogy are mighty impressive:
• Four months of solid research.
• Nearly four years to compose.
• A total of 11 hours of music.
• More than 50 leitmotifs (individual themes).
“It was pretty daunting at first,” Shore admitted of the task. “Writing film scores is always difficult to do – but the funny thing was, I didn’t want to stop when it was over.”
Shore has since moved on to other projects: He’s preparing a staged version of The Fly for L.A. Opera with film director David Cronenberg and author David Henry Hwang (M. Butterfly). [More]
Actor Christopher Lee has agreed to put aside his differences with Kiwi director Peter Jackson – but will never forgive him for axing his scenes from The Return of the King. Speaking exclusively to the Herald on Sunday at the Rose d’Or festival in Switzerland last night, Lee revealed that while he was still upset by the decision to remove his character, Saruman, from the third instalment of the Lord of the Rings series, it was now time to move on. “When the third film came along and I wasn’t in it, I didn’t understand,” he said. “And I still don’t. “However, you can have a difference of opinion in any walk of life but you can’t have ongoing arguments. I like Peter very much. He’s a brilliant director. I just don’t know why he did what he did.” [
Actor Andy Serkis was languishing in showbiz obscurity until he landed the role of Gollum in Lord of the Rings. He provided the character’s voice and movements but only briefly appeared on screen himself. He repeated his CGI antics as the great big monkey in King Kong, out on DVD now. [