THE HOBBIT To Shoot In The UK… To Allow Christopher Lee To Appear?

Peter Jackson is balls deep in The Hobbit right now, but the films aren’t shooting just as one big chunk. There are hiatuses and breaks, and it turns out a move to the UK. Talking to Vulture Elijah Wood reveals that he’s heading to the UK to shoot The Hobbit before doing more work in New Zealand. So why the UK and why is this actual news?

It’s news because Christopher Lee, who played Saruman in the original Lord of the Rings trilogy, is too unwell to travel to New Zealand to reappear as the White Wizard, so it looks as though production is coming to him in the UK. That’s great news, because Jackson’s version of The Hobbit includes lots of extra stuff you didn’t see in the Rankin-Bass version, including Gandalf’s meeting with Saruman (not yet a bad guy) to discuss the rising evil of the Necromancer at Dol-Guldur. The Necromancer turns out to be none other than that asshole Sauron!

Elijah also doesn’t know in what context Frodo will appear in The Hobbit. While he agrees with most of us out here that it makes sense that he be in book ends, nobody’s told him nothing. I guess you don’t need to see script pages when PJ calls you back to Middle-Earth.