Microphones in Middle-earth...the BBC Lord of the Rings

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by Brian Sibley

Unfair!! I might have done, but a lot of other good material was also cut that - had there been time - might have cried out for reinstatement...

Hmmm, does this mean there are some 'out-takes' and deleted scenes lurking in the cellars of Broadcasting House?

No, the trolls were omitted. Sorry. I remember being envious when I first saw the Trollshaws figures created for the Jackson film and thinking that he's done something visually that we hadn't done... But in the end, I believe, we had to wait for the extended version to see them!

I think that leaving them out was a sensible move myself. The stone trolls don't 'do' anything beyond prompting more tales and to try to portray them coherently in an audio format would have taken up far too much time I think. The one benefit of film/TV is that you can simply make a sculpture of something like that (or the fallen 'head' decked in flowers at the Crossroads - for another example) and have it sitting in the background while dialogue or action is happening.

Of course the listener to the radio version is always free to imagine the things the group might be passing on their way to Rivendell.

Anyway. I'm intrigued about these radio plays of the Gormenghast books now and I'm going to have to see if I can find a copy of those! I hope I can - and maybe they will become more widely known because one thing I've noticed is that Peake's work is finally getting a bit more recognition these days - he even shares double billing with Tolkien in next week's episode of The Worlds of Fantasy!