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'I don't want to play the fat guy or the friend all my life'

Stoic, loyal Samwise Gamgee is the great unsung hero of The Lord of the Rings. But his interpreter - actor Sean Astin - is now planning a life outside Middle Earth. He speaks to Victoria Barrett

Friday December 19, 2003
Sean Astin is tired and looks it. Swamped by an overcoat, the actor better known as Samwise is huddled in the corner talking into his mobile while simultaneously supping a beer. He's spent an exhausting few hours signing autographs for teenagers at the Collectomania event in Milton Keynes, sat in a booth in a shopping centre putting his best face on for the crowds, and then answering questions put to him by an audience at the local cinema. "It's been a long day," he says with a weary smile.
Three of the hobbits - Elijah Wood (Frodo) Dominic Monaghan (Merry) and Astin (aka Sam) have flown to the UK straight from a three day press junket in New York. But while Monaghan and Wood bounce around the bar chatting to everyone and anyone, Astin sits quietly in a corner. He looks older than his colleagues and not as relaxed in the sudden company of strangers. "I absolutely do not think that I have even a vague recollection of what normal life is like." He says quietly almost to himself rather than to me. He looks as if he'd rather be at home.
The Return of the King, the last of Peter Jackson's epic trilogy, is set to break box office records and, by most accounts, bag itself a clutch of Oscars in February. But the film also serves as a powerful showcase for Astin's performance as Samwise Gamgee, the sturdy halfling who accompanies Frodo into Mordor. Less regal than Aragorn, less wizardly than Gandalf, and altogether less enigmatic than Legolas, you could say that Sam is the great unsung hero of The Lord of the Rings.
Astin says that he feels he did some of his best acting on the trilogy, especially at the close of the third film. But he insists that although Sam has to make sacrifices and confront terror, Frodo is far more important. He insists that Elijah Wood carries the dramatic weight of the film, the rest of the cast are left in the wings of the ring.
Earlier in the day, Elijah Wood had explained that: "We both felt like we'd actually done everything there was to do with our roles. We felt like we had gone to the peak as actors on the film."
Astin admits that it has been hard to break free of the film. "I don't really want to be stuck in Lord of the Rings all my life. I did become desperate to make sure that I could do something else with my life."
"However, life has been swallowed by the Tolkien phenomenon. When it is all over, it'll be a bit of a let down. It depends on what other work gets cooking and whether we end up having success with other projects soon or if it is a slower process but I expect that there will be a definite sort of 'ookkaaay'. I am sure that the films will have a lasting effect in some way, shape, or form as long as you don't take yourself too seriously it will be fine."
The son of Patty Duke and John Astin, Sean Astin was born in California in 1971 and found early success in films like The Goonies and Rudy and Memphis Belle. He did not know that his real father was rock promoter Michael Tell (who Duke married for 13 days in 1971) until a DNA test in 1994. He now has two daughters himself and the eldest - Alexandra - has the small part of Sam's daughter in the final film. Family and sense of citizenship are important to him and have enabled him to avoid the pitfalls that many other former child stars fall into.
"I think that I have a seriousness of purpose, a lot of support and a healthy amount of good fortune. I'm pretty lucky but I realise that that downturn is always only three months away from anybody." He takes his civic duty seriously, serving on various wildlife, anti drugs, literacy and Aids charities.
Most curiously, he has also served since 1995 as a civilian aid to the Secretary of the Army. This involves him travelling "around US installations and learning from the army what it is they are trying to do... I was raised in a liberal family and consider myself to be a Clinton Democrat. My father was shocked to see that I would agree to do that but I felt it was my responsibility. "
His service on the presidents council on Service and Civic Responsibility spurred him on to help during the recent New York blackout. "It just happened! I found myself gravitating toward the police station. It seemed like a safe place to be. Because of my work with the president's council I decided to help, I thought it would make a good story. It was like being in the middle if a comic book! Mostly I just rode with the police officers and when we'd get to an intersection that was blocked I'd back up the cars so our van could get through to get to people trapped in elevators and stuff."
With the recent election of Arnold Schwarzenegger in Los Angeles it is not hard to presume that Astin is nursing some political ambitions of his own. But when questioned about these, he says. "Where were you when I was in eight grade and I was running for president and I didn't even make the run off!"
Whatever long-term aims Sean has, the near future is taken up with beating a retreat from Middle Earth. His next role is with Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore in the comedy Fifty First Kisses. "I don't want to play the fat guy or the friend all my life," he says. "What I am aiming for and what I hope will happen is that I will be able to carry a picture". He formed his own production company, Lava Entertainment, at the age of 21 and has produced a number of short films such as Kangaroo Court, which garnered an Academy Award nomination. The most recent production, The Long and the Short of It, featured on the extended DVD of 'The Two Towers' film.
He sees producing and directing as the obvious next step to his career. "I want to do more work behind the camera. It's something I have been building towards for ten years. I have been optioning screenplays and working of projects, films and TV shows to direct. I think I have an aptitude for it - a passion, you might say."
He grows animated when we talk about his pet project, a film based on Erik Larson's book Isaac's Storm about the Galveston storm of 1900. Winds of over 140mph swept the town leaving 6,000 people dead, and 3,600 buildings destroyed. "I am trying to figure out how big the reach is for the film and I'm thinking about how to portray the story in a way that will make it surprising."
The experience of being Samwise continues to haunt him. He plans to write a book based on his experiences in New Zealand tentatively titled There and Back Again: An Actors Tale. One suspects that this is all part of his search for closure "It's just a way for me to re-live the experience and put a button on it. It's amazing because we talk about the movies so much; we travel all over the world. But whenever you are talking on a chat show or to a journalist, in the way you answer the questions, you can't help but take into consideration who the audience is. So this is just a chance to... go back through the whole experience and look at it objectively, and be able at the end of next year to move on."

aptitude – uzdolnienie
blackout – brak prądu, zaciemnienie
booth - stoisko
civic duty – obowiązek obywatelski
Downturn – spadek powodzenia
to garner – zbierać
Huddled – wciśnięty
Junket – wyjazd finansowany przez kogoś innego lub z publicznych pieniędzy
to nurse – żywić (nadzieję, ambicje)
to option – the right to buy something in the future
pet project – ulubiony projekt
Pitfall – pułapka
recollection - wspomnienie
Regal – królewski
to spur – zachęcać
Stoic – stoicki
Sturdy – mocny
To sup – spożywać
To swallow – połykać
Swamped by– w za dużym
tentatively – wstępnie
Unsung – niedoceniony
Vague – niewyraźny
Weary – znużony


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