Breaking Bread with Denizens of Middle-earth

The air is crisp on this, a rather routine Tuesday morning. The sky blankets the horizon in a bleak, shimmering azure blue fairly devoid of clouds and eschewing any visible traces of ozone depleting haze. In the distance, an East Bay mountain range displays snow capped peaks which rise into the atmosphere and seem to gaze with whitewashed command over the faraway suburban landscape.

This is not your typical February weather, even for the temperate West Coast. Something is definitely in the air. But then this is not your typical February afternoon, either. I mean it's not every day that you get invited to dine with a coupla denizens of Middle-earth.

Alright, I didn't really get to sup with some Middle-earthians, but I did chow down with actor Karl Urban and director Harry Sinclair, two New Zealanders who just happen to be in Peter Jackson's big screen version of the Tolkienian epic.

Karl Urban as Caesar in Xena: Warrior Princess

Urban and Sinclair are in town promoting the latter's new romantic fairy tale The Price of Milk. And they're not alone. They have the striking Danielle Cormack in tow. Ms. C is best known to us Yanks for her recurring role as Ephiny on Xena. As for Mr. Urban, well he's usually recognized as either Caesar or Cupid from both Xena and Hercules. And some may recall Mr. Sinclair as Roger the butcher in Brain Dead (that's Dead Alive to us US of A folks).

But I digress. As I mentioned before, we were experiencing rather unusually pleasant weather on this particular Tuesday (February 13, to be exact) so lunching outside in San Francisco's historic North Beach sector was the way to go. And since we were all cinephiles of varying degrees, eating at Francis Ford Coppola's Niebaum-Coppola restaurant seemed the perfect thing to do. After our somewhat swarthy waiter (who had a wondrously eccentric fondness for grand gesticulation) took our orders and delivered the wine, well, it was the perfect thing to have done.

In lieu of divulging what each of us ate (sorry all you pining and whining fanboys), let's get to the meat of this story: the LotR dirt.

Harry Sinclair

Sinclair and Peter Jackson go back a ways. Sinclair found himself with a bit part in Dead Alive and even garnered a "Thank You" in the credits of Jackson's Heavenly Creatures. Subsequently Jackson's name turns up in the credits of Sinclair's The Price of Milk. Seems these two gents enjoy lavishing praise and thanks on one another with some frequency. And Jackson's latest parlay in their little game of kudos was to give his compatriot an actual part in his latest cinematic undertakings. Not a bad way to tell an old friend how much they mean to you, eh? "I play Isildur. He's...I've got three lines in the film, so it's just a little character, the ancestor of Aragorn," explains Sinclair. "[I get to do] heaps of fighting, though it will probably get cut down to 15 seconds," he adds with a laugh.

With "heaps of fighting" being the operative phrase here, does that mean that Peter made his fellow director friend attend arduous hours under the supervision of a Master of Arms? Actually, Bob Anderson, legendary Hollywood swordsman responsible for making Errol Flynn the epitome of swashbuckling finesse (and for instilling proper light saber dueling etiquette into Darth Vader) was the man responsible for sword wielding technique transference. "He's this elderly dude, but he was fantastic. He showed me a thing or two," laughs Sinclair. "It was great. I did some huge battle scenes, like 700 people on a mountainside. And the New Zealand Army were some of the extras. They'd yell 'CUT!' but some of these guys just kept hackin' away at each other," Sinclair raises his arms and begins slashing them about as if they were gilded shafts of steel, laughing all the while.

"Just how heavy was the damn sword you were forced to wield?" were the words I found myself stammering out between ducking Sinclair's flailing arms.

"Uh, most of the extras didn't entirely use such heavy swords, but I was using a metal sword most of the time."

Ahhh, to brandish steel in a melee of epic proportions... Who wouldn't relish that opportunity? "It was quite therapeutic, actually," recalls Sinclair. "I really hurt a couple of stunt guys badly." He pauses, then breaks out into mildly raucous, but extremely jovial laughter. "We were rehearsing this scene and they wanted it to be 5 seconds long and I had to kill five orcs or something... Oh my God, so we tried to speed it up and I just got this guy in the thigh with the tip of my sword and he fell over in pain. He said 'It's fine, it's fine, man, it's fine.' So we did it again and I got him again..." Sinclair's story trails off into almost uncontrollable laughter before he regains his composure, "He was fine, he's a stuntman. But it was horrible. I was doing my best, but they kept trying to make us do the scene faster, faster, faster. But it was fantastic."

"Well, I got one in the 'nads," pipes up Urban. Sinclair, Cormack, and I stop laughing for a moment, letting the severity of having a sword thrust into your man-sack really sink in. Urban, seeing our concern quickly adds "No, no, I didn't get it there, I gave it there." We all bust out laughing again, neglecting to pity the poor fool who was on the receiving end of Urban's blade.

Karl Urban as Eomer

So how was Karl's experience? "Phenomenal. Much similar to Harry's, you know huge battle sequences, ummm, incredible, it was amazing just to be part of it." Speaking of parts, Karl has a fairly good sized one in that he's portraying Eomer, 18th King of Rohan after the War of the Ring; before this, he was Third Marshall of Riddermark. The role seems tailor-made for Urban, seeing as how he has some serious equine time under his belt (years ago he starred in a New Zealand show entitled Riding High, which, lo-and-behold, was about horseback riding) and Eomer is known for his riding skills. "Lots of riding. I spent a whole month, five days a week, every week, doing horse riding lessons because Eomer is of Rohan, a horse nation." Sinclair, ever the jovial gent, politely interjects at this point, perhaps concerned that his comrade is taking his Middle-earth history a bit too seriously, "Karl, they're just a fiction... you know they don't exist." We erupt into casual laughter as Urban gives Sinclair one of those glances that old drinking buddies give one another when they succumb to drunken chiding. Sinclair, realizing that he's getting the best of his chum quickly seizes the opportunity to transform himself into temporary interviewer, lashing out with the type of hard-line question I probably wouldn't have asked: "Do you have any love scenes in Lord of the Rings?" Karl, realizing that he's in deep now, responds with quickness, "Not with anyone else."

By this time, perhaps it's the wine, perhaps it's the fact that we've spent close to four hours talking about movies and other asundry things, whatever the case may be, the conversation takes a turn for the risqué (you can imagine which course it took given the implication of love scenes, fairies, and horses). After much laughter, we finish out the meal talking of other things, like how long the tour of Alcatraz is (Karl is fascinated with being locked up in solitary, re-living the Clint Eastwood Escape from Alcatraz fantasy), why Zinfandel is such a rare commodity in New Zealand, and whether or not there's anything exciting to do in San Francisco on a Tuesday evening. As for me, well I just sat back with that satiated feeling you receive after a good meal and equally good conversation. Quite a Tuesday, indeed.

Believe it or not, Spence D. has never read The Lord of the Rings trilogy. He's also Senior Editor of IGN For Men.

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This is a fan site and is not affiliated with Filmforce, Spence D., The Lord of the Rings movies, Harry Sinclair, or Karl Urban. I have no intention of infringing on the copyrights of anyone affiliated with the actors, the author, or the movie studio. This is just my way of showing my appreciation for a talented actor!