The announcement that The Hobbit was going to be stretched across three films rather than two caught a lot of people in Hollywood off guard, and apparently the cast were no different, with Hugo Weaving revealing that he has only just found out!
“I found out The Hobbit was going to be a trilogy quite recently, when everyone else found out about it,” confirms the star. “Originally, when I said goodbye to Pete [ Jackson ] in L.A., I said, ‘I’ll see you on The Hobbit ,’ and he said, ‘Well, I’m not doing The Hobbit .’ And then, it was, ‘We are doing The Hobbit , but I’m not going to direct it.’ And then, it was, ‘Well, I am directing it now.’”
“And then, it was, ‘Actually, we’re doing The Hobbit in two films.’ So, when I went to shoot it out there, there were two scripts and two films. Now, I’ve just found out [ about the third film ], not that long ago, when it was announced. He said, “Well, we’ve got all this fabulous material and these wonderful people.’”
“They hadn’t filmed the final battle sequence yet, which would have been at the end of [ the second film ],” continues Weaving. “For a number of reasons, they decided that there are three films in there. I hope there are. I don’t know. I was truly there for four or five weeks and enjoyed myself, and went home again.”
Doesn’t sound like a bad life, does it? The first part of the trilogy will be unveiled in a couple of months when The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey opens in the UK on 14 December 2012.