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May 05, 2006 - May 11, 2006

News for May 11, 2006

LOTR Concert Summer Series 2006!

5/11/06, 3:56 pm EST - Xoanon

New York, NY, May 15, 2006 – Howard Shore’s The Lord of the Rings Symphony: Six Movements for Orchestra and Chorus reaches a milestone this summer when the San Francisco Symphony presents the 100th performance of the work since its debut in Wellington, New Zealand in November 2003. The two concerts at San Francisco’s Davies Hall on July 14 and 15 are highlights of a busy summer season for the symphony, which will be presented in additional concerts both in Europe and in the United States. The Royal Scottish National Orchestra will give two concerts on June 24 and 25 as part of its annual ScottishPower Proms series, followed by performances in two German cities – Nürnberg (July 28) and Aachen (August 18). USA dates added too! [More]

TV Watch: Ian McKellen on 'Last Call'

5/11/06, 12:50 pm EST - Xoanon

Ian McKellen is slated to be a guest on 'Last Call With Carson Daly' tonight on NBC. He is there to promote 'The Da Vinci Code' which opens worldwide on May 19th and 'X-Men: The Last Stand' that opens a week later on the 26th. 'Last Call' airs VERY early in the morning on NBC at 1:36AM. Watch this space for a clip!

Shadowfax the showbiz veteran rides again

5/11/06, 12:39 pm EST - Xoanon

Blanco, the white Andalusian horse which featured in the Lord of the Rings movies as the sorcerer Gandalf's horse Shadowfax, has taken on a new show business role in America. Blanco, a showbiz veteran after four years of work in the LOTR movies and two years on the set of the Hercules television series, is now performing in equestrian shows. [More]

News for May 10, 2006

PJ Steps into the 'Heart of the City'

5/10/06, 2:40 pm EST - Xoanon

Magpie writes: Peter Jackson and Tim Burton are making an appearance in the Heart of the City comic strip to encourage budding filmaker, Dean, to follow his own vision. The teaser for their appearance was on May 6th, but we don't know who has shown up until May 8th, (These comics are only available a week back... checking sooner rather than later is good). The current day's strip is always found here.

Get 'Lost' Tonight!

5/10/06, 2:22 pm EST - Xoanon

Dominic Monaghan's Golden Globe winning show 'Lost' is on tonight at 9PM EST on ABC. TORN's chatroom now has a special 'Lost' screening room, login to #lost at 9PM and watch with fans from around the country! [ABC.com] [TORN Chat]

News for May 09, 2006

Tolkien Course at Honolulu Community College

5/09/06, 10:24 am EST - Xoanon

LeiLani Hinds writes: I am an English professor who has been a huge Tolkien fan since 1967, and this fall I will be teaching a course on Tolkien for the first time at my college, Honolulu Community College in Honolulu, Hawaii. Students can earn 3 credits of transfer-level college credit for taking English 257L J. R. R. Tolkien. The course will focus on The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, with parts of The Silmarillion brought in to provide background for a fuller understanding of The Lord of the Rings. [More]

Tahi the kiwi gets a new leg

5/09/06, 10:18 am EST - Xoanon

If you are a bird that does not fly, having two legs is pretty important. So when a wild kiwi lost one of his legs below the knee to a gin trap, a New Zealand zoo decided to help out this iconic native bird. The zoo decided to see if it could fit a prosthetic leg to the North Island brown kiwi. For help, the zoo turned to its neighbours - the Wellington Artificial Limb Board and the Weta Workshop, makers of special effects for movies such as Lord of the Rings and King Kong. To create a mould of the bird's stump, Gina Acevedo, prosthetic and visual creature effects art director at Weta Workshop, used the same techniques on the kiwi as he would on a film star. [More]

Serkis Unveils His 'Heavenly Sword'

5/09/06, 10:15 am EST - Xoanon

From gaminghorizon.com: Sony Computer Entertainment has announced that Ninja Theory is hard at work on Heavenly Sword for the PlayStation 3...When the invading King (played by Andy Serkis) destroys the warrior clan that guards the Heavenly Sword, the clan leader’s daughter, Nariko, takes up the sword in a desperate fight for survival. Nariko must now pay the ultimate price as she embarks on one last mission of vengeance against the King and his army before her life is finally drawn to a close. Andy Serkis, the world’s leading CG actor, famous for his roles as Gollum in “The Lord of the Rings” and Kong in “King Kong”, was heavily involved in the creative process. As well as starring in Heavenly Sword as the villain, King Botan, Andy was a major contributor to the character development, writing, casting, directing and performance capture for the PLAYSTATION 3 game. [More]

News for May 08, 2006

Mortensen Honored at St. Lawrence University

5/08/06, 10:18 pm EST - Xoanon

Adele sends this in: North Country native and Hollywood superstar Viggo Mortensen will be one of three former graduates to be honored at St. Lawrence University's Commencement on Sunday, May 21st. [More]

A stellar cast in Kiwi horror movie...

5/08/06, 10:14 pm EST - Xoanon

The New Zealand feature film THE FERRYMAN commenced principal photography in Auckland, on 31 March and is well on track to wrap on Saturday 13 May. This official NZ/UK co-production is produced by key producing partners Matthew Metcalfe (Nemesis Game) and Atlantic Film’s Alan Harris (Wallis & Edward). Developed initially by New Zealand producer Matthew Metcalfe, this production rallied from concept to production in only 14 months...This independent New Zealand horror has attracted a strong local as well as international award-winning cast including Emmy-Nominated John Rhys-Davies (The Lord of the Rings, Indiana Jones); Kerry Fox (An Angel At My Table, Shallow Grave) winner of the Silver Bear at Berlin in 2001 for her Leading role in Intimacy; Tamer Hassan (The Business, Football Factory); Craig Hall (The World’s Fastest Indian, King Kong, Perfect Creature); Julian Arahanga (Once Were Warriors, The Matrix); Lawrence Makoare (The Lord of the Rings, Die Another Day), Amber Sainsbury (Channelling Baby). [More]

'The Ring of Words' Review

5/08/06, 7:57 pm EST - Xoanon

Kerewyn sends along this review from worldwidewords.org: The Ring of Words : Tolkien and the Oxford English Dictionary "It’s little known that, before he wrote his famous books, Tolkien worked as a sub-editor at the Oxford English Dictionary for two years, helping to compile the last section to be published. Peter Gilliver, Jeremy Marshall, and Edmund Weiner—the authors of this book—are among the present-day senior editors of the same work. Their commemoration of his linguistic facility comes a little late to the Tolkien party, but will interest anybody who regards the language of the books to be one of their prime qualities."

Pre-Order 'The Ring of Words : Tolkien and the Oxford English Dictionary' on Amazon.com today!

Wood Enters 'The Legend of Spyro'

5/08/06, 7:53 pm EST - Xoanon

From gaming.hexus.net: The completely new Spyro adventure, featuring gameplay focused heavily on dynamic action and fast-paced combat, uncovers the true origin of Spyro the Dragon as he evolves into a living, breathing weapon of explosive destruction! This epic story of Spyro's quest to discover his roots and realize his destiny is amazingly brought to life by leading Hollywood voice-over cast members Elijah Wood (Frodo Baggins in The Lord of the Rings trilogy) as the new voice of Spyro; David Spade (The Benchwarmers) as Spyro's sidekick Sparx the dragonfly; and Gary Oldman (Sirius Black from the Harry Potter films) as Ignitus, the Fire Dragon Elder and Spyro's mentor. [More]

Jackson busts Dam rumours

5/08/06, 10:23 am EST - Xoanon

King Kong director Peter Jackson has scotched suggestions his next directorial project could be a remake of second world war epic The Dam Busters. The Mail on Sunday reported the story yesterday but Jackson has now made it clear his next film will be The Lovely Bones, an adaptation of the Alice Sebold book of the same name, in which a murdered 14 year old girl recounts the story of her death from beyond the grave.

News for May 07, 2006

Congress for Medieval Studies 2006

5/07/06, 10:15 pm EST - Xoanon

CLM writes: This afternoon I had the pleasure of attending a conference session featuring Tolkien scholar Tom Shippey at the 41st International Congress for Medieval Studies in Kalamazoo, MI. The topic of the lecture was forging the national epic, using "forging" in both the sense of forgery and of creation. Mr. Shippey gave a fascinating and sometimes humorous talk about the national claiming of and identification with epic stories, sometimes involving claims on the same story made by multiple nations, and the process of definitively locating those stories based on examination of people and place-names. [More]

News for May 06, 2006

Tucker out, Weitz in for 'Golden Compass'

5/06/06, 4:59 pm EST - Xoanon

Tristan writes: I know you've been following the development of the His Dark Materials fantasy films by New Line, so I thought you might be interested to know that it was announced today that Chris Weitz will be returning to the director's chair for The Golden Compass, following the departure of Anand Tucker over "differences in creative direction" -- the full press release is online here. [More]

Is Lord of the Rings London-bound?

5/06/06, 4:57 pm EST - Xoanon

The Lord of the Rings, the $28 million mega-show now having its world premiere engagement in Toronto, is braced to get a big boost from Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber. Lloyd Webber — the undisputed king of mega-musicals as well as one of the wealthiest men in the world — made a 24-hour flying visit to Toronto last weekend just to catch the show. "He was very excited by what he saw," David Mirvish said yesterday. "And it's a great tribute to this production and this city that he was interested enough to fly all the way from London." The upshot: Insiders say LOTR's next gig is likely to be at London's Theatre Royal Drury Lane, owned by Lloyd Webber's Really Useful Group. [More]

News for May 05, 2006

Happy Birthday John Rhys-Davies!

5/05/06, 9:13 am EST - Xoanon


Today is John Rhys-Davies' birthday! John was born on May 5th, 1944 in Wiltshire, England. That makes him 62 years old today! Happy Birthday John!


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