Movie News

James Nesbitt and a Little More on The Hobbit

Posted by on October 3, 2012 at 5:13 am

James Nesbitt is a busy man.  He seems to pop up somewhere new every day.

Earlier this week he was giving a talk to schoolchildren as part of the launch of Northern Ireland’s Cinemagic International Film and Television Festival, and afterwards he spoke to Culture Northern Ireland about The Hobbit.

Asked about getting the role of Bofur, James said,

‘I got a call in 2010 asking me if I wanted to audition for this Hobbit film and I said no way! I like to move quickly, be collaborative, not get too tied down by anything and obviously a project like this is the opposite of that. But I was persuaded to do an audition tape and afterwards thought “Oh dear, I thought that went quite well!” And it obviously did, as Peter offered me the part.’

On Peter Jackson?

‘The man’s a genius. He’s very quiet, very a nice. He’s a lot like a hobbit himself, actually. And then occasionally you see that thing, the flash of inspiration and you realise just how fast his brain is working, how he is putting everything together. It’s remarkable.’

And the rest of the cast?

‘Ian McKellen is undoubtedly the most talented person I’ve ever worked with. He works so hard on the text, he’s an inspirational figure. Martin Freeman is incredibly disciplined, unbelievably funny. The whole experience was an utter privilege. It’ll take me a few years to digest it. My face is on the side of a passenger jet! Air New Zealand: the airline of Middle Earth! I have my own Lego piece! It’s amazing!’

The first part of The Hobbit trilogy The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey gets its world premiere in Wellington, New Zealand on 28 November 2012.

 

Picture by Richard Redshaw (James Nesbitt) [CC-BY-SA-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Share with your Fellowship!
Tags: , , , , , , ,
Author: Evie was introduced to Tolkien's work by her boyfriend, over a beer in the Eagle and Child pub in Oxford. She went home, read the books and, a while later, married her boyfriend. She has only recently discovered fandom, after years of eye-rolling by her husband and children, and is delighted to find it warm and welcoming and not-at-all weird. As well as tracking down bits of news and sharing them with others, she leads ponies for Riding for the Disabled and loves the cinema and theatre and her wildlife garden.