Rings is a truly massive production, and your character is right in the middle of the biggest battle it’s ever shown. But for much of that battle, he and Celebrimbor are off in this little world of their own. You mentioned how much that helped your performance — what was it like stepping from that quiet environment into all-out war?
Even though it was just us on the set, and it was essentially a two-man drama, you feel the resources the show has, even inside, because you’re in a completely interactive forge. You’re standing there and you still get the scale of the production, because they’ve built the forge.But then you go outside and it really hits home, because things are exploding. When I’m walking along the parapet, I’m trying not to flinch, because things are exploding around me, and Sauron wouldn’t be flinching at explosions. And those explosions are real. The courtyard in the city — that’s all real. It’s just the horizon that’s CGI. It fulfills every dream you’ve ever had as an actor to be able to play in a world like that. It’s easy to get caught up in the budget, or the expectation, or the narrative that comes with being part of a project like this. Particularly this project. You see the number of people who are there to help tell Sauron’s story. But ultimately, we’re children going to play on this set every day. Anytime you get weighed down, whether it’s the pressure or the expectation, all it took was for Charlie and I to look at each other and be like, “Look at your ears! That’s amazing!”
Tags: charlie vickers, interviews, the lord of the rings, the lord of the rings: the rings of power, the rings of power, TV, vulture