The Shameless Plug: The Fellowship Of The Plug

0:14A podcast is never late, Nick Dissemblian. Nor is it early. It arrives precisely when it means to. hello Nick Chris I come to you now at the turn of the tide a line of course spoken in the two towers by Gandalf the White not Gandalf the Grey I just saw the two towers at the weekend did you extended edition on the big screen all four hours of it did you extend your edition with a four hour Peter Jackson intro was it that exciting it was amazing it was amazing mind-blowingly cool why are we talking about Lord of the Rings Nick hello pod I'm Chris Hewitt Welcome to the latest episode of the Shameless Plug.

0:56This is the 12th edition. 12th? 12th? Can I even say that? 12th edition. 12th? Am I tripping up on that? This is the 12th edition of the Shameless Plug, which, of course, brings you the behind-the-scenes stories behind the latest issue of Empire Magazine. And every month I am joined, whether I want to be or not, by my friend and neighbor, Nick Dissemblin, the editor of Empire Magazine. Hello, Nick. Hi, Chris. You can call me Mithrandier. if you'd like to. This is my proper title. I'm trying to enforce that a bit more. And the issue we are talking about, Nick, remember from the very beginning of this podcast, I've been asking you, are you doing anything special for issue 450 of Empire?

1:39And you've been saying, no, can't be arsed, mate. Just the normal thing. You were lying. You were lying because this issue, March 2026 issue of Empire Magazine, issue 450 is an absolutely stupendous event one magazine to rule them all on the cover 25 years of peter jackson's the lord of the rings the fellowship of the ring and on the cover we shot the fellowship five numbers five ninths what is that as a percentage it's more than half five nines. It's more than half. It's about 70 % I would say. But then once you factor hobbits in, right? Because they're quite small. So is a hobbit, is like two hobbits, one human?

2:24I don't know. Fun fact, the other four members of the fellowship are there as well, but they're just behind them, so you can't see them. No, that's not true. I mean, it would have been amazing to get them all together, but they are all spread across the globe on different adventures. Quests. Questing. But we did speak to all of them, but we'll get to that. We will get to them. We reunited The Four Hobbits. The Four Hobbits. Elijah Wood. Elijah Wood. Dominic Monaghan. Dominic Monaghan. Sean Astin. Sean Astin. And Billy Boyd. Billy Boyd. Ian McKellen. Stop it. Stop it. For an amazing shoot, which we did back in August, because that was the only window that we had to get them, and we had a day with them.

3:01It was incredible. Go online and watch our videos with them. We have a couple of videos that are really fun. They talk about their tattoos in one of them. They all got matching tattoo at the end of the shoot. They all got the Elvish, was it? The Elvish rune for nine. But it's more than, it's like the king's very own rune, isn't it? Stop pretending you know Lord of the Rings. I watched one of those videos. Okay. I watched one of those videos. Yeah, they have a tattoo, and they all have them in a different place. Ian McKellen's is on his shoulder. I don't know why I know that. Mine was in Wellington.

3:30Indeed. So yeah, it is an issue of special magnificence, which took a long time to put together. I want to say six months. I've been working on this for six months. six months it's not easy when you're doing because I did a big feature for the 20th no for the 15th 10 years ago the 15th anniversary we got the nine members of the fellowship to interview each other you won an award for this didn't you? I did win an award for it yeah best fellowship of the ring best inspired feature no I won an award which was lovely because it took bloody ages it was amazing tell the folks what it was what your idea was we basically asked each of the nine members of the fellowship the actors to write nine questions for one of the other ones.

4:12And then we did it, we called it the ring cycle and it went around. So it looped around so the last one then asked the questions. In hindsight, I'm not so sure you should have won an award because you did very little work. I did lots of work. Most of it was one of the actors. Did you just hear what you said? We got them to come up with questions. So you got other people to do your work for you and you waltzed off with a trophy for it. Oh yeah. You charlatan. There was a lot of nudging. There was a lot of excuse me no that one took ages as well because they're all busy people they're all all over the world and you know there's always one of them that you're trying to get and can't quite get hold of and then it all came together and it came together this time as well is this something you've been planning for a while though were you hoping that it was going to happen because obviously it is 25 years of fellowship which makes me feel very very old indeed and were you thinking okay let's do something big let's push a boat out now this isn't 25 years of fellowship to the release date.

5:09This is 25 years of Fellowship. If I'm right in thinking, Nick, you've timed this to the year, but also it's 25 years pretty much since the very first magazine cover for Fellowship of the Ring, which was indeed Empire Magazine. Elijah Wood as Frodo holding Sting. Yeah, it's... Passage on the bottle. Sting was furious about it. But yeah, no, it was something that I had the idea in the summer and then we met with Warner Brothers and we proposed it to them because they were kind of involved. And actually, the film, my theory, it's not been confirmed, my theory. You know, the films are in cinemas at the moment.

5:45My theory is they timed it to this issue. No, genuinely, it started the same week as our issue came out. So coincidence or not. Coincidence? I think that they were kind of a bit inspired and they were like, oh, right, yeah, we should do something. That's what I think. It's amazing. I might be wrong. I might be a massive narcissist. But yeah, and then it was interesting. We had that conversation in the summer and then you know a day or two later I was on Instagram and something popped up saying that Ian McKellen and the Hobbits were going to be in London and we were like oh we should try and get a day with them and it wasn't easy to get the time in the end two of the Hobbit actors came to the shoot straight from the airport wow which two?

6:27Sean Astin and Elijah Wood oh damn it yeah well because they all live abroad now don't they? and Dom and Billy Dom and Billy live overseas I believe I don't know but it was very nice of them to do that and they appear at conventions together quite often they're on a tour around America at the moment I think but they haven't been you're ruining the magic you're making it sound less special no no but I'm saying they hadn't been they hadn't been with Ian McKellen for a very long time so it was a very special thing it was a very special thing that's amazing this is incredible so this is the centerpiece rightly so Nick because these films are a towering a two-towering achievement in modern cinema history.

7:10And it's not just The Fellowship of Being Reunited. You've done all sorts of stuff here. So let's talk. Let's go through it. You should go through the features section, feature by feature. There's only one place to start. Ian Nathan, who I think is, what, probably in the premiere Lord of the Rings film writer, scribe, person in the world. He's literally written the book. He has literally written the book. Anything you can imagine, which if you haven't, if you're a fan of Lord of the Rings and you've not read that, get a copy straight away because it's absolutely fantastic. But yeah, we asked Ian, there was no one else, to talk to Peter Jackson and Philippa Boyens for us.

7:46And yeah, I mean, Ian was on the set of the Lord of the Rings films 25 years ago. So he's been interviewing Peter Jackson for as long as these films have existed. And it was great. It's a great read. Peter Jackson does an impression of Sean Connery at one point. Does he? Yeah. Does that come across well in the future? I'd love to hear the audio of it. I haven't heard the audio, but I'd love to. Because you may know, Sean Connery was the original Gandalf. He was. And he never got back to, they asked him to play Gandalf and he was too busy playing golf or something. So he just never got back to them.

8:19It led, of course, to that classic Connery quote years later when he did The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, where he had turned down the Matrix. And he said, he said something, I'm paraphrasing, but he said something like, I was offered Lord of the Rings and didn't understand it and turned it down. I was off at the Matrix. I didn't understand it, so I turned it down. I don't understand this, but I'll be fucked if I'm turning it down. And of course, it was his last super movie and it was a horrible experience for himself. He said that about Sir Billy as well. Yeah, but he, can you imagine Sean Connery grappling with, you shall not, you shall not push.

8:51Genuinely, it's the one sliding door that I think would be really interesting. I do not want to erase McKellen from history. McKellen is iconic and indelible as Gandalf. I'm not taking that performance away. but I would love to go to a multiverse where Connery is Gandalf because he would have been incredible. I'm sure someone can do it and will do it with AI. I don't think Ian McKellen is, I don't think you can, I don't think there's anyone on Earth who could have done Gandalf with that twinkly eyed, you know, there's so many different, I've just been watching the films remastered on the big screen because they're out again in cinemas as we're recording this.

9:28I'm seeing a five hour version of Return of the King on Saturday. Really? Five hours. All the endings. Yeah, all 94 endings. Wow. But yeah, I've just been blown away all over again by many things. But Ian McKellen, I think, is just the heart of these movies. He's amazing. But Connery would have been incredible also, I think it's fair to say. Obviously, I think a lot of the casting is, and the casting close calls are out there now. And Stuart Townsend famously was Aragorn just for a week, two weeks or so, something like that. And then they thought, well, this isn't quite working out. James Corden auditioned to play Sam Sam can you imagine you know what I can him and Frodo in the back of a singing in the back of a car driving around Mordor do you think the Chukka brothers auditioned because they'd have been a great Miriam Pippin oh my god that'd be fantastic to me to you just throwing the ring around but anyway back to the thing Ian does a terrific interview with Peter Jackson and Philippa Boyens they confirmed we'd heard rumours of the Mithril cut.

10:33This mythical, even longer Mithril, Lord of the Rings, Mithril, with extra stuff thrown in, you know, maybe the Arwen at Helm's Deep stuff that's talked about a lot and all this other stuff. Somebody swore to me when I went to New Zealand for Avatar, somebody I won't name swore to me the Mithril cut was real and I thought it was but according to Peter Jackson, not. Maybe he has just forgotten about it. He's lost it down the back of the sofa. Yeah, he's been too busy hanging out with the Beatles to do that. But that's amazing. That's a four-page feature that kicks off our FOTR coverage by Ian Nathan.

11:09Opening line. Yes, we're returning to the opening lines. Peter Jackson pauses, stares into the middle distance. There you go. Technically speaking, that was two sentences. That's how I start every one of my Zoom calls. But no, it's a great... And then we have the reunion of the Hobbits and Gandalf. And this was overseen by Dan Jolin, right? Dan the Grey. Yes, Dan, who has done a lot of ringsy stuff. He has a walking appendices. And yeah, he went down there. He has appendices removed, I hear. Much like the theatrical auditions. So yeah, no, he went along and had a great old Natter with them. and it was all just very lovely because like I said they hadn't seen the four of them hadn't seen Ian McKellen for quite a while so it was it was just a lovely old to quote Ian McKellen this is a lovely reunion he said at the end did he say that?

12:08yeah oh that was nice yeah just waiting to see what happens when we reunite the stars of X-Men Days of Future Past oh yeah here's Dan's opening line if there's one thing we've learned from the Lord of the Rings movie trilogy is that a wizard is never late nor is he early. Boom. And you're like, where are you going with this, Dan? Where are you going with this? To find out, you're going to pick up the issue. But it's cracking. But hey, listen, just because we couldn't get Orlando Bloom and Sean Bean and Figo Mortensen and John Rhys-Davies at that physical reunion, don't worry. We've got you. We've got you covered.

12:47So you reunited them virtually in pairs. Talk us through that. So the theme was fellowship, even though we're celebrating all three of the films but we jumped on that word as a kind of the theme of the issue and so we thought it would be nice to interview them in different pairing or in different configurations so Ian McKellen and the Hobbits obviously make sense because that's how Fellowship starts and then obviously Orlando Bloom and John Rhys Davis as Gimli and Legolas the Elf and the Dwarf who are kind of double act through the movies and then Viggo and Sean who have one of the best scenes in the whole trilogy which Viggo Montensen tells us is his favourite scene in the whole trilogy which is the death of Boromir at the End of Fellowship sorry fun fact Vigga Mortensen and Sean Bean had not talked since the Empire Awards 2009 that is a fun fact this was there and they got back in touch through this interview and it was lovely asked for each other the details and boom Boromir and Aragorn reunited and maybe off on another adventure that is lovely and this was also Dan and Dan introduced it thusly there are surely few who would dispute that Sean Bean and Fico Mortensen shared one of cinema's greatest death scenes the former expiring as flawed Gondorian Lord Boromir fucking hell damn this is a long one pin cushioned with orc arrows the latter as the man who would be his king this is still going on filling Boromir's final seconds with hope for the beleaguered nation that was the extended cut yeah that was That was the five-hour edition of that sentence.

14:23I love that. That means a special video intro to Peter Jackson to that sentence. But yeah, no, it's fantastic. And Dan had an amazing Zoom chat with Sean Bean that was doing press for Anemone that day. He carved out some time. And they were really, really, really happy to talk to each other. And they talked for like almost an hour, I think. So we may end up doing extended cuts of these Q &As. How apropos. We have quite a lot, so we may do that. Watch out. That would be amazing. So 25 years on, if you asked me to give you a detailed interview about what I was doing 25 years ago, I'd struggle. These guys, were their memories jogged?

15:05Did they have anecdotes loaded and ready to go? Was there anything fresh? There was stuff. I feel like I know a lot about these films, and there was stuff I didn't know. I didn't know, for instance, that they reveal in this interview, who talks about it. Vigo talks about John Rhys-Davis having a lazy boy chair that contractually had to be carried around to every set. So he could sit in this reclining chair and even if they were on a mountain, he would be brought up in a helicopter. And that is an amazing story I've never heard. It's a shame because I did the Orlando John Rhys-Davies interview and I did not know that.

15:37Otherwise, I might have gingerly raised it, but maybe it's best I didn't. Gingerly raised it, I'll assume. You're absolutely right, Nick. You did indeed talk to Orlando Bloom and John Rhys-Davies, Legolas and Gimli, of course. and here is your opening line and this is rather lovely. They were and are a study in contrasts and stop. You hear that, Dan? He stopped. I should have put a comma in there. That was my mistake. Eight words. And I love that it's a study in contrasts because that's a study in contrasts with Dan's sentence, which is very Tolkien-esque in that it's still going on. Yeah, mine is a haiku.

16:14Dan's is Moby Dick. but yeah again it was I took this one myself because I just thought it would be really fun to talk to these two and there's so much fun in the movies and they were fun and we talked about their favorite Gimli Legolas moments John Rhys-Davis extolled he was in Austin, Texas and he talked about the sushi there being excellent Why was he in Austin, Texas? Business meetings he said Business meetings? Yes Sounds like Richard Linklater to me Yes He did tell me more but I probably shouldn't put it on a podcast. Oh, no, no, no. By all means, dude. Yeah, so his account numbers are...

16:50He was there. Orlando was in LA, I think. And yeah, it was fun. Again, a really long, fun chat which ran wildly over the time we had. And they were just really happy to chat to each other. And yeah, it was really fun. Good. They didn't kill anyone during the call and then tally up the scores at the end to see who had killed more. But otherwise, it was really fun. Did John Rhys-Davies go, you could have picked a better spot. He did, actually. yeah the signal was a bit spotty alright so they both told me just a bit of trivia from that they both told me that they both offered their Lord of the Rings weapon to Zelensky in Ukraine really?

17:27yeah so he now has an axe and a boat no he doesn't apparently you're not allowed to give weapons to political figures so I would think so yeah so anyway so that was an interesting unexpected bit of insight I got there I would think so alright so everyone who's watched these movies and there are many of us who have watched him many, many times, will know that The Fellowship is perhaps a byproduct of the time when J.R.R. wrote it. And The Fellowship are therefore a great big old sausage factory. It's nine ruddy bloody blokes. So Nick, you wanted to introduce a little bit of, you wanted to tip the scales a little bit, didn't you?

18:09You wanted to not just have a bunch of bloody sausages in this. Yep. It's not just Lord of the Rings, it's Ladies of the Ring. Like it. Yeah, again, on this theme of pairing people up, we thought it would be really fun to ask Cate Blanchett and Liv Tyler to talk to each other because they both play elves in the movies, elves, but don't have a scene together. Yes. Although, they did shoot one. Did they? We asked about. Liv Tyler, the only thing she could remember was that she was sitting down in it, but otherwise couldn't remember anything that happened. but there is an image online of the two of them in costume in the same scene, but it's not been seen by anyone.

18:47But yeah, they got on and they were talking about playing elves, and Liv Tyler talked about her marmalade business. I'm reading it now. I love the reaction to Helen. Helen O 'Hara did the interview. She asks, did you consider getting the fellowship tattoos the boys went for? And their answers are very funny. I'll leave it to you to find out what it is. Helen's opening line is they may be ageless near goddesses but that doesn't mean that Galadriel and Arwen sorry Cade Blanchett and Liv Tyler have time to spare I want to know more instantly it's a really fun read and I just just to say like the fact that all of these the whole main cast said yes to doing these interviews and eagerly kind of jumped on when they're all very busy people and it's difficult to schedule stuff which just speaks to how much they love these films that's amazing are happy to be part of them.

19:38So, yeah, I think we pretty much... Oh, and that's not all. No, how did you finish this, Nick? How did you finish the celebration? Well, we wanted to obviously salute in the past, but we also wanted to look a little bit into the future. And there is a new Lord of the Rings movie in production, or in pre-production, being to be directed by Andy Serkis. It's Lord of the Rings, The Hunt for Gollum. What? And it's gearing up in New Zealand right now. And so we asked Andy Serkis to write us a piece about his time on The Rings films and how it's prepared him to direct this new film himself and sort of take over the baton.

20:15It's a good read. All right, I'm going to give Andy Serkis the same level of respect I gave everyone else. Sorry, Andy, you wrote a piece for us. Read his last line. No, that's what the fuck? No. But you do it in a Gollum voice. I can't do Gollum voice. Go on, I believe in you. Anyway, his opening line is... Do opening in a Gollum voice. I don't think I was there. Go on, this is promising. Nasty hobbitses, nasty, nasty hobbitses. I don't think I would be exaggerating if I were to say that Peter Jackson, as well as being one of cinema's most phenomenal movies... Where am I going? Where am I from?

20:51You've gone full skeletal. May we make us a he-man? You know what I'm doing? You sound like the bad guy from The Raccoons. I'm doing the guy from the Gaberlo Park. I'm doing the meerkat. I am Alexander. Oh my god. Now I've forgotten how to do him as well. That was pretty good though. I was doing alright for a while. Precious, precious. You sounded like if the meerkat from the Gokun Pair was corrupted by the One Ring and enshrouded in darkness. Only time will tell, precious, only time will tell. That's not bad. That was pretty good. It wasn't good but I'll allow not bad. Alright, thank you. There you go, Lord of the Rings celebration.

21:29What are you going to do for the two towers? What next year? Yep. Just getting back together again. Slightly different questions. Every year to diminishing returns. Yeah, and this time I'll tell Dan to write a shorter sentence. Oh my God, don't restrain Dan. He is unfettered. If people had told Tolkien to write less, we wouldn't have these books, therefore these movies. All right, next feature. Let's race through the feature section. In case you don't like Lord of the Rings, imagine that. We have a feature on Gore Verbinski's new movie, which kind of came out of nowhere. I don't think it was widely known that he was doing this.

22:06Gore Verbinski, of course, the brilliant filmmaker behind the original Pirates of the Caribbean movies and Rango and films like that. His next film, Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die, looks absolutely bonkers. Yeah. He says, it has fuck it energy, to quote Gore Verbinski. I mean, he is a fascinating guy. He made these giant blockbusters in the Hollywood system and now has kind of gone rogue and is now making smaller films with a lot of kind of anarchic energy, of which this is one. It's got Sam Rockwell as this kind of time-traveling guy who comes back to present day, is it LA? Yeah, I believe so, yeah.

22:46Yeah, and rocks up at a diner dressed in some kind of... Well, he claims to be time-traveling. Right. So we're not sure whether he is indeed a time-traveler. He says there's a cataclysmic event that's happening in the future and he needs to recruit some people to stop it from happening, but they don't know whether or not he's telling the truth. I'm guessing he is telling the truth, but I guess it's part of the movie's charm. I haven't seen the film. I don't know. I'm really looking forward to it. The trailer looked absolutely berserk. It looks unhinged in a good way. And I mean, Gore Verbinski is a great interviewee.

23:16He talks about AI and calls it a whiny little bitch at one point. And rightly so. And we talked to Sam Rockwell as well, who is a lot of fun. So yeah, it's a really interesting read and I'm very curious about this film. It looks nuts. Jamie Graham wrote the feature. His opening line is Gawr Fabinski is grinning Gawr Fabinski? No, it's Peter Lorre I'm morphing it to Peter Lorre Gawr Fabinski is grinning like a madman see, short, concise, to the point well done, thanks Jamie what is next? it is My Father's Shadow so this is yeah, this is like a small but really kind of interesting looking film it's made by these two British guys, Wale and Akinola Davies Jr., and they've made it about their dad, and it was kind of based on a childhood trip back to Nigeria that they had with their real dad, and it's them kind of recreating it on screen, and it's got a kind of backdrop of political turmoil, so there's a lot going on in it, and it starts Shopei Durizu, you might know from Gangs of London, among other things, and yeah, it's a little cracker that we really wanted to celebrate and give some space to, because it's a really kind of original great British film.

24:32Yes, indeed. Coming out soon, in fact, I think next week, February the 6th, Amon Woman wrote the feature and his opening line is thus, Akinola Davies Sr. was the type of man people would tell stories about. Again, concise, to the point, no fannying around, excellent stuff, My Father's Shadow, I hear great things about it, I have not seen it. I have seen the subject of our next feature. It is Is This Thing On? which is Bradley Cooper's third movie as director. And this one has an unusual origin story. And this is the focus indeed of our feature because this is a movie that is essentially but also not really about the life story of the British comedian John Bishop.

25:22So if you don't know John Bishop, I think most people listen to this one who John Bishop is but John Bishop started off as a stand-up comedian entirely by accident. He went into a comedy store called The Frog and Bucket in Manchester about 25 now 26 years ago when he was in the middle of a very painful divorce from his wife Melanie and to avoid paying the cover charge in order to get in for free they said put your name down as an open mic night. He did and he found himself called up on stage. he had nothing prepared to say. So he started talking about getting a divorce and found that he had a knack for stand-up comedy.

26:02He is now one of the most famous and successful stand-ups, I think, in the world, certainly in the UK. And as a result of this, got back together with his wife. And they're still going strong all these years later. And this is a story, this film is not about John Bishop, it's about an American comedian or American guy called Alex Novak and he is played by Will Arnett from Arrested Development and BoJack Horseman and you know Will Arnett he's amazing and a very popular podcast called Smartless of course Voice of Lego Batman Voice of Lego Batman he's brilliant and he co-wrote this this movie so he's been the driving force behind it then Bradley Cooper came in to direct it because he was really drawn to the story how do I know this because I did the interview and the interview is with Will Arnett and John Bishop together.

26:54This was a logistical challenge, Nick, because they were not even in the same country. Wow. Will Arnett was in London promoting is this thing on... John Bishop was in Australia. Wow. On tour, where he was doing his 25th anniversary tour and it took him to Australia. But we managed to get them together. It was really late for John Bishop, really early for us, but that's fine. And yeah, it was a really, really fun conversation. Were you with Will Arnett in the same physical space? We felt that that would be bad for sound. Right. You would have to keep spinning your chair. Possibly. And then also we felt that it might mean that I was naturally biased towards the guy who was sitting beside me and I'd keep directing questions to him and maybe Bishop would feel a little bit excluded.

27:38So we decided that I did it for my flat. This is good behind-the-scenes juice. Thanks, man. Am I mistaken or did you once do a stand-up set? Did you ever try stand-up? No, I'm hoping to this year. I found it's one of the things I'd like to do before Big Birthday comes up later on this year. But I've never done it. I've never done it. But I've seen loads of stand-up. And every now and again, I'll go to a stand-up comedian and go, I could do that. I could do that. And then I'll see someone else. My wife and I went to see Josh Johnson on Saturday night. Do you know who Josh Johnson is? I don't. He's amazing, amazing.

28:09He's a fast-rising stand-up from the States who's come over here. Show how fast he's rising. The last time we went to see him, he was at the Soho Theater Walthamstown. pretty big venue but still and now he's sold out four dates four shows at the London Palladium like that and he's amazing and a bit like John Bishop he goes on with really nothing prepared like he has things he wants to talk about but he doesn't have jokes written down he just talks to you for an hour hour and a half and he's amazing and you see someone like that or Sarah Keyworth who was his opening act and you go nope can't do that but I could do what they do but not what they do anyway it's a great conversation it's a great piece it's a really good film I watched it over Christmas and there aren't that many movies I don't think about stand-up there's funny people and Lenny and things like that punchline yeah they're not really that funny the films and this one is really funny but also has a lot of heart yeah and a great just fantastic original story yeah I think it's terrific and sadly it hasn't made a dent in the Oscar race which is a shame I think it might be my favorite of Bradley Cooper's three movies as director I was going to say this thing but me too are you going to read your own first line out I am in a derogatory fashion it's short and concise and to the point you've heard a million a man walks into a bar gags now let's just stop but none with a punchline like this none with a punchline like this golem back in your box back in your box my Peter Lorre golem oh god that would be awful alright so that was a really really fun interview I had about an hour with them and then I'm sorry it's me again it's more Chris Hewitt You turn your back on an issue for five minutes and it's riddled with you.