About everybody can enjoy and admire eccentric actors utterly devoted to their profession but to work with them and actually succeed is an altogether different kettle of fish. To rephrase a well-known saying, it takes one - who is even more creatively unconventional - to guide one. Here is a typical story featuring One Man Who Ruled Them All:&nbsp;<blockquote>“…there was this big tree right above Bag End. One morning Peter looked at it and suddenly he had his doubts. Something looked wrong about that tree. He therefore decided it had to be replaced. He was looking for a similar tree, just one that would feel right. Peter found what he needed not far from Matamata, a 29-ton oak. The rest was pretty straightforward: the tree was cut down, transported to the site and placed right where the old tree had been. The only problem was the leaves that didn’t survive the rehoming – so Peter asked his crew to paint about 2000 leaves and attach them to the tree one by one!”</blockquote>

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One Man Who Ruled Them All

Exceptional as it was, <a href="/blog/king-of-gondor">Viggo Mortensen's devotion to his character</a> was anything but an exception - and both "elves" and "hobbits" were every bit as devoted as "men". For instance, Sean Astin who signed the contract for the part of Sam Gamgee, flew back to the States and immediately began his preparations. When he returned to New Zealand after 6 months of extremely hard work, Peter Jackson went to pick him up at the airport. The very moment they met, Peter felt furious. ‘Sean, have you EVER read your contract?!’ The embarrassed actor had to admit that he had, in fact, done no such thing. He was too busy going to a gym to stay in good shape. Peter nodded, produced a copy of the contract and shoved it into Sean’s hand. “Read here”, he pointed at a highlighted clause. Sure enough, the clause made it very clear that Sam Gamgee was a typical portly hobbit – and that’s how the actor was supposed to look by the time the film shooting began. “You’ll live the next two weeks on nothing but noodles, cakes and muffins,” Jackson hissed “or that part will go to someone else!”

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A Typical Portly Hobbit

On a Sunday morning residents of a quiet neighbourhood in the middle of Wellington were woken up by blood-curdling battle cries. As they looked out their windows they saw a man attacking an imaginary enemy with a sword in the middle of a completely empty street. No wonder that somebody called the police. When the police arrived, the following dialogue took place.&nbsp;“You must surrender your sword and follow me to the police station”.&nbsp;“I am Aragorn, son of Arathorn. I am the king of Gondor and I can’t take orders from a cop”!That dialogue helps to explain, why the "King of Gondor"s sword instructor regarded him as the best student he had ever had. If you also consider that the swordsman learned Sindarin, the Elvish language, and practiced it daily with Liv Tyler who played Aragorn’s sweetheart Princess Arwen, you'll fully appreciate why the Lord of the Rings' director Peter Jackson was so keen to have certain Viggo Mortensen on his team.

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King of Gondor

I have seen many trees and was impressed by quite a few of them – yet never as much as by that Kiwi tree with an allegedly typical Maori name “pohutukawa”.The closest image doing justice to it would probably be of an upturned volcano that is erupting and frozen at the same time. That beauty can be experienced but very rarely, too, because the trees are blooming only between November and January, mid-December being the period of their peak activity. This activity results in what New Zealanders describe as “Red Christmas”. The extended Red Christmas I was so incredibly lucky to savour for almost two full weeks, has become one of my most stunning lifetime experiences.

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Pohutukawa

Did you think there were only Seven Wonders in the world? Years of traveling have convinced me that there are at least a thousand times more. Quirky people, hilarious situations, breathtaking views and sites, inspiring ideas.I hope to share some of those wonders with my fellow human-beings who are curious about our wonderful world.&nbsp;<div class="raw-html-embed"><video controls="" classname="aspect-video">
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