2) Tolkien was friend with C. S. Lewis (he wrote Chronicles of Narnia if anyone has been under a rock for the last few decades.
3) The Special Editions of all three of the movies are 158 minutes longer than the Theatrical releases.
4) WHAT EVERYONE COMPLAINS ABOUT. Tolkien did not have the eagles fly the crew to Mount Doom because he did not want to give the impression that they were “Middle-Earth taxis.” They are their own race. Also, he found them one-dimensional and did not like them.
5) The first Portuguese version of The Hobbit was changed into O Gnomo (the Gnome).
6) Christopher Lee (Saruman) is the only actor in the Lord of the Rings films to have met Tolkien. In fact, Tolkein’s dying wish was to have Lee play Gandalf if there was ever a Lord of the Rings film. Adding to his badassory, Lee formed a metal band, holds the Guinness Book world record for being the tallest leading actor in Hollywood (6 foot 5), and he was related to Emperor Charlemagne.
7) When Tolkein’s son Michael went into the army, he had to fill in paper work. Under his father’s profession, he wrote ‘Wizard.’
8) In the 1960s the Beatles approached Stanley Kubrick with an idea: they wanted to make a live action version of the Lord of the Rings. It would have featured John Lennon as Gollum, Ringo Starr as Sam, George Harrison as Gandalf, and Paul McCartney as Frodo. But Kubrick wasn't interested.
9) Sean Connery turned down the role of Gandalf because he didn't understand the story.
10) Tolkien would often start lectures off in an energetic way. Sometimes he would put on full chain mail armor or come in reciting the first lines from Beowulf at the top of his lungs.
11) Tolkien did not see Frodo as the hero of The Lord of the Rings he said that the true hero was Sam. From that perspective, it would change the opinion of any first time reader.
4 of 5
Fascinating. I knew a small handful of these facts, but I was unaware of a great many. This was really interesting, thank you for bringing this up. I just have two side notes.
ReplyDelete1. Can you imagine how cheesy The Lord of the Rings would have been if it was made into a live action film in the 1960's? How the heck would they have done something like the Balrog? It could have been clay animated, or a giant puppet (that was somehow on fire)! Just my own personal opinion, but we probably dodged a bullet there.
2. Tolkien cane into his lectures wearing full chainmail? ....... That's awesome!!!! I would have taken that class just to see such a thing. Were do you think the armor is now? in some kind of display case, or in a hall or honor like the shards of Narsil?
How did I know that you would get really excited about Tolkien coming to his lectures in armor?
DeleteI like these facts, I knew about fact 6 and to add to it I heard that he only turned down the role, because he felt that he was too old to play gandalf when the movie was first in production.
ReplyDeleteI never knew that Tolkien saw Sam as the hero. I never read the books but I have seen the movies, and I always thought Sam was the hero. I even remember commenting when watching the movies that Sam should have totally carried the ring into mount doom. He was way cooler and didn't whine as much.
Haha Profession = Wizard
These are all so fascinating to me. I knew nothing about J.R.R. Tolkien except that he wrote Lord of the Rings, so thanks for teaching me a little bit about him. My personal favorite is fact number eight because I absolutely love The Beatles and would pay a bunch of money to see them in a live action version of this story.
ReplyDeleteI'm suddenly really depressed that Christopher Lee played Sarumon now. A man's dying wish is kind of an important thing, and Tolkien has left a tremendous legacy. I dunno. I'm weird like that.
ReplyDeleteLove the facts!!!! I could have used some of these for my paper on Tolkien I wrote my senior year. I did not know Christopher Lee actually met Tolkien, that is AWESOME!
ReplyDeleteThe movies killed Sam. There is a drinking game - take a shot every time Sam cries. But with that in mind, I think I will view the books a bit differently.
ReplyDelete