Читать книгу An A-Z of JRR Tolkien's The Hobbit - Sarah Oliver - Страница 20

David Tennant, James McAvoy and Tobey Maguire had all been considered for the role of Bilbo.

If Peter Jackson had to liken himself to any character from Middle-earth, he would pick Bilbo. As he explained to Sasha Stone from the Mirror: ‘I really should identify with a sword-wielding hero like Aragorn [from The Lord of the Rings] but really, I identify more with a comfort-loving hobbit like Bilbo Baggins, who would rather put his feet up in front of the fire and eat cakes and drink ale, and not go on any adventures and lead a quiet life.’

Martin Freeman is a British actor, originally from Aldershot, Hampshire, England. He trained at the Central School of Speech & Drama in London and is a versatile actor, having appeared in numerous TV shows, theatre productions, movies and radio shows. Best known for playing Arthur Dent in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (2005), Tim in the UK version of The Office and Dr Watson in the TV series Sherlock, he won a 2011 BAFTA TV Award for playing Dr Watson (picking up the Best Supporting Actor Award). This has been his biggest accolade to date, but his performances in The Hobbit movies could see him win an Oscar or Golden Globe in the future.

Martin was told initially that he would have to be in New Zealand for 18 months straight but that wouldn’t have been practical for him because he has a family. In the end, he had to juggle filming The Hobbit movies with episodes of Sherlock, which wasn’t easy but allowed him to go back to the UK to see his two young children. Thankfully his partner Amanda Abbington understands what it is like because she is an actress, too. Though unmarried, they frequently call each other husband and wife and are happy as they are with their two children, two dogs and a cat.

When filming in New Zealand, Amanda told Daily Mail journalist Vicki Power: ‘When he’d been out there for over six weeks, he really needed to see us. His heart ached a little bit. But we know the film is going to be huge.

‘He does get stressed, though. Sometimes he rings me up at 7 am to say: “I’ve been covered in c**p, hanging upside down and I’ve got bloody ears on.” But he knows it’s for the greater good and he does it with a smile.’

Peter Jackson is so glad Martin took on the role. He told fansshare.com: ‘He is fantastic and there is simply nobody else for the job. We couldn’t find anyone who was better than him. He is simply fantastic.

‘He’s Bilbo-esque. You might not always want to say that about you, right? But seriously he has the essential features of this little English gent, this country gent who is slightly old-fashioned and has to go around in the world and try to cope with it.

‘That’s not exactly who Martin is as a person, but as an actor he does that so well – the fish out of water with a sense of courage but also a wonderful sense of humour. The things that happen to him and the way he reacts to them – things he’s never seen in his life before as a stuffy little Hobbit – his response to it all is part of the charm. And he does have a great openness in his face.’

Playing an upbeat hobbit was hard work on the days when Martin was covered in mud and there were long days filming, too.

Sir Ian Holm played the older Bilbo in The Hobbit movies and in The Lord of the Rings trilogy. Born in Goodmayes, London to Scottish parents, he trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, graduating in 1953, and then worked in Stratford becoming one of the lead actors in the Royal Shakespeare Company. Throughout the fifties and sixties he performed in numerous Shakespeare plays in the UK and USA before appearing in his first movie, The Bofor’s Gun (1968). The part of Flynn earned him a BAFTA for Best Supporting Actor. Throughout his long career, Ian has been nominated for over 30 different awards and, altogether, picked up 19 of them – quite an achievement. One of the finest actors the UK has ever produced, he has previously been nominated for an Oscar but that was back in 1982 for Chariots of Fire, so he is well overdue another nomination.

During a press conference before shooting began, Martin was asked how he would be playing Bilbo. He replied: ‘Obviously I’ve been looking at what he [Ian] was doing; there’s a certain level of course of which I have to match what he’s doing and then forget it as well so I’ve not been tying myself in knots about it but I have been trying to be sensible and just literally look at what he’s doing, what his voice is doing, what his movements are doing. And I genuinely, without being bigheaded or falsely modest, I think I’m quite a good match for him. I’ve seen worse matches and I think I can do a young Ian Holm. So I’m looking forward to it, but bearing in mind that I can’t be playing Ian Holm, you know what I mean. But of course I’m going to have that echoing and nod to what he did.’

Ian filmed his scenes and close-ups for The Hobbit in England rather than coming all the way to New Zealand, so Martin actually stood in for him in a scene with Elijah Wood (Frodo). Before they began shooting, Jackson and his crew watched the footage that Ian had done in London so they could easily match up the shots. Hobbit superfan Eric Vespe got to witness what happened and wrote in his report for AintItCool.com: ‘While I didn’t talk to Elijah about it, I bet it meant the world to him to have Martin there actually giving a performance for him to act off of. Freeman even adopted a little bit of Ian Holm’s speech patterns for these scenes and was so good at impersonating Ian Holm that more than once I wondered if the voice I was hearing over the coms was Ian’s on playback or Martin’s in real life.

‘Usually in these situations they’ll have the script girl or one of the dialect coaches read the lines and while that works a charm, there’s something extra special about a performer giving a performance.’