Lord of the Rings: Return of the King

It’s about time Elijah Wood had a breakthrough mainstream success. He was such an awesome child actor in films like Radio Flyer, and even brought serious weight to mediocre films like The Good Son and The War. As a teenager, he made some art films, but The Lord of the Rings will surely be the title that his agents put at the top of his resume when negotiating a fee for future movies. The first two films grossed over $300 million each and the third is likely to do the same. Sure, that’s largely attributable to the fan base from the books, the ensemble cast and the vision of director Peter Jackson, but it can’t hurt Wood’s asking price. Wood seems to be taking it all in stride. He’s fulfilling his press duties for the film by doing interviews, but not going out and partying for tabloid attention. He doesn’t take credit for much himself, honoring all of his collaborators from the films equally. Here’s Elijah Wood, for the last time as Frodo, discussing The Lord of the Rings.

Did your feet get torn up going barefoot all the time? I think my feet were at their healthiest in New Zealand. They’ve gone considerably downhill since the films. I mean, they were pampered, man. I had to put these feet on every day, so at the end of every day they’d be bathed and powdered and massaged.

No calluses? No, in fact they removed a lot of my calluses. They’re all back now.

Do you worry that people are going to see as Frodo for the next thirty or forty years? Well, there's really no way around that. The movies, they've almost gotten themselves into pop culture like immediately. It's stunning to me. I certainly didn't anticipate it.

Are you done with Frodo? I mean, I've left him behind, but a part of me will always be connected to that character. A peace of him will always be with me, but in terms of being recognized as Frodo for the rest of my life, it's something that I'm very proud of. I'm very proud to be a part of these films. I'm very proud of the character and simply to have to worked with all of the people that I've worked with to have worked with Peter Jackson and to be a part of something so beautiful.

Do you have Frodo toys at home now? I've got a lot of the action figures. The thing is that when the movies started coming out and the merchandise started coming in, I basically just said, “Listen, send everything. I want everything. I don't care if it's underwear. If it's got something to do with Lord of the Rings, I want it,” because when am I ever going to have an opportunity again to be a part of something that has this kind of massive merchandise. It's like being a part of Star Wars. I’ve got boxes and boxes of it. I'm going to have to put it into storage. There's a lot of stuff that I'm missing. I know that there's tons of stuff that they didn't send. Like, I don't have any of the Weta Workshop stuff. So, all of the maquettes and stuff which I've kind of held off from pressuring them because, I mean, I will get them eventually. I just haven't yet.

What's the weirdest thing that a fan has asked you or done to you? I had a woman breakdown and cry when she met me which was difficult to deal with because immediately when someone starts to cry, you want to comfort them, you know, “Poor thing.” I comforted her. I tried to make her feel better.

How old was she? She was in her late teens, early twenties. She had just seen the movies a variety of times and loved the characters. I've seen signs made, ‘Elijah, marry me.”

What did you discover about yourself through this journey? I don’t often think about myself in relation to the character that I play. But I think that Frodo ultimately accepts a responsibility and has the courage to accept the responsibility and to carry on through his journey and carry his journey out. In that way, I’d like to do the same thing. But I think that the journey that I went through as a human being working on these movies, like the journey that Frodo has, it’s kind of prepared me for anything in life and made me a stronger human being I think and maybe a more courageous human being. Maybe I did inadvertently learn that from Frodo, but it’s also from the experience as well. And then on another level, I think the experiences making these movies have profoundly affected my life.

Profoundly? Well, the time spent in New Zealand. I was 18 when I flew to New Zealand at the beginning of production, and I spent 16 months in New Zealand and consequently the last three years. And I grew up there. I grew up in New Zealand and became the person I am now as a result of those experiences and shaped by those people and shaped by New Zealand and shaped by everything that I went through while I was there. So that’s how it’s affected me.

What does New Zealand have that we don’t? There’s a real purity in New Zealand that doesn’t exist in the states. It’s actually not an easy thing to find in our world anymore. It's a unique place because it is so far away from the rest of the world. There is a sense of isolation and also being protected. It’s also nuclear free. It’s like a sanctuary for nature and for the natural world, so it teaches a lot of lessons. It’s a very powerful place to live and spent time because it is so protected and it is so geographically beautiful and pure. And the people are incredibly kind and sweet as well.

Is there a difference between fans of the book and of the film? They’re kind of different. I mean, I think that fans of the film aren’t necessarily fans of the book, and I think the same can be said of fans of the books as well. But I think they also kind of meet in the middle. Fans of the books are also fans of the films and vice versa. And I think that at times, their passion can be the same. But fans of the books obviously have been living with these stories for quite a long time.

Do you see your contribution to the phenomenon? Yeah, I have. And I’m very proud of that. I don’t often think of it in those terms, but yeah, it also, the films have also sort of eeked themselves into pop culture immediately as well. It’s just kind of wild to think of what we’ve done and what culminated out of the 16 months of us working in New Zealand has become this phenomenon. But yeah, I certainly acknowledge my role in that and I think I’ll always be recognized for that.

Did you ever think it was weird that you were playing a 50-year-old? What was daunting about it was the fact that there was already a massive fan base for the books and people that had already spent a lot of time with that character. So the daunting thing was to represent that character in such a way that pleased all of those people. And pleased myself and Peter. So initially, I think I was very concerned about playing him in the right way and making sure that I stayed true to the character as people had seen. And then that kind of let go once we started filming. I kind of let go and I wasn’t so worried anymore and just kind of it all felt right and I just went with it. And once the movies have come out, people seem to be pretty pleased with the way that Frodo was captured.