The Death Of Saruman...

It’s about now that I mention Peter Jackson’s recently confirmed plans for a tripartite cinematic version of Tolkien’s saga, presuming the actor already knows about it. He doesn’t. Lee’s dumbstruck.

“A film? Of The Lord Of The Rings ? And they’re going to do the whole thing? I mean, I’ve always thought it would make a superb film, but when you start thinking about it it’s such a colossal canvas, with all these tremendous battles apart from anything else. The one between the Riders Of Rohan and the Orcs at Helm’s Deep, I mean, God, that’s a film by itself, and then outside Mordor when Sam and Frodo are travelling with Gollum... How are you going to get somebody to play Gollum?” Lee makes that distinctive swallowed gulp at the back of his throat…

“I mean, you’ve got the four hobbits, five if you include Bilbo, and then there’s the story back in the Shire, when Sharkey has taken over, so you’ve five or more hobbits, three wizards – the White, the Grey and the Brown... Were there any others?” The Mastermind chair might be terrifying, but it’s got nothing on Christopher Lee’s stare. Fortunately, the actor provides his own answers. “No, there were five wizards who are mentioned in one of The Unfinished Tales , but you end up with Radagast The Brown, Gandalf The Grey and Saruman The White, the three Istari. Now they can be played by actors, and the Orcs are just make-up, but the Ents... How are they going to do the assault on Orthanc? I would think that to tell the whole story would cost $200-300 million. Are they going to get that sort of money?”

During the filming of his death scene in The Return of the King, Peter Jackson began to coach him how to react when Saruman is stabbed in the back by Grima (Brad Dourif), but Lee interrupted him, reminding him that Lee actually had heard the sound a man makes when he is stabbed in the back.

Eldorion wrote:
Amazing. Great find, Malick!

I was aware of Lee meeting Tolkien and the (rumor? confirmed fact?) that Tolkien liked the idea of Lee as Gandalf

I think Lee would have captured a side of Gandalf that was downplayed in McKellen's portrayal

but on the other hand, I think they were both superb in the roles they ended up in

 Making Saruman more prominent was one change that I thought worked extremely well in the films, and much of that was down to Lee[/b]

Also, I was Googling for information about Lee and Tolkien and stumbled across this gem on the LOTR Wikia, which I had forgotten about entirely.
During the filming of his death scene in The Return of the King, Peter Jackson began to coach him how to react when Saruman is stabbed in the back by Grima (Brad Dourif), but Lee interrupted him, reminding him that Lee actually had heard the sound a man makes when he is stabbed in the back.

When I arrived in New Zealand to start filming as Gandalf, in the first week of the 21st Century, Peter Jackson held a dinner for some of the cast. I was happily next to Christopher Lee who I had known of throughout my actor-admiring life. He'd been cast as the white wizard Saruman but his opening line to me was: "I've always thought I should play Gandalf. I read 'Lord of the Rings' every year - sometimes twice." He then treated me to a snatch of the black speech of Mordor and I felt inadequate. Not that that was Chris's intention: he was 78 and well practised in the art of gentlemanly rectitude. The epitome of "tall, dark and handsome" kept any inner demons for his acting Dracula, Frankenstein's monster and, once, as Sherlock Holmes. It's what made his Saruman so effective. With his long beard and white robes, he had the air of a stern yet benign Pope that belied his ambition to rule Middle-earth, with cruelty and spite. Between our facing-off on the set, he could easily be persuaded to reminisce. After all there were over 200 films on his CV and a couple of singing albums. His earliest intention was to be an opera bass., Touchingly he was a little nervous at the outset. "Peter made me do my first speech 10 times!!" I told him not to worry as the previous day I'd had to repeat a scene 27 times. His dark eyes widened and glinted but he didn't complain again. Peter was tickled to have his Hammer Horror hero as the villain and devised a spectacular death to acknowledge his vampiric past - falling onto a spike which pierced his dastardly heart. Chris didn't much approve and I think the episode can only be seen in the extended Director's Cut. An odd pity that he didn't work in the theatre, nor direct a film, like his idol Laurence Olivier who had Chris as a spear-carrier in his film of 'Hamlet.' But he was justly proud of the span and success of his career in movies and when knighted must, like all of us, have been pleased to share a title with Sir Larry. The last time Saruman and Gandalf filmed together was 'round a table in Rivendell but while Galadriel, Elrond and I were in the Wellington studio, Sir Christopher's interjections were filmed in London some months later. You can't tell. In movies, all is not as it seems. Yet when he joined the "Star Wars" cast he said he did all his own stunts without benefit of a stand-in. That certainly wasn't true of his gravity-defying fight with Gandalf. I suspect he just wanted to declare he was in old age fit for purpose. He needn't have worried. His acting prowess never declined. -- Ian McKellen, June 2015

azriel wrote:Hello RA  
Just like in RL you meet friends & relatives at bad times

Eldorion wrote:Well I mean he was an asshole to Pippin until halfway through ROTK so there are certainly visible traces of it in the films.  He showed his crabbit side with Sam in FOTR too.