Rings of Power stars reveal how movie portrayals shaped performances
Morfydd Clark and Robert Aramayo are playing much younger versions of Galadriel and Elrond in the new prequel series.
Amazon Prime Video's mega-budget Lord of the Rings prequel The Rings of Power finally gets underway this week – with the opening two episodes debuting on the streamer on Friday 2nd September in the UK.
The series is set thousands of years before the events of The Hobbit, and so most of the characters we know and love from previous adaptations of J R R Tolkien's work are absent from the show.
However, there are a couple of familiar figures that do feature prominently – chief among them younger versions of Galadriel and Elrond.
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Morfydd Clark and Robert Aramayo take over from Cate Blanchett and Hugo Weaving respectively in the roles, and both actors spoke exclusively to RadioTimes.com about whether those previous performances influenced their approach.
"I didn't approach her as a different character – I think even if I'd tried to I've watched those films so many times that it's deeply embedded in my psyche," explained Clark. "And I really just liked to know where my character was going.
"I read a lot – I kind of grew up with The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings but hadn't kind of delved into like The Silmarillion or the Appendices or The Unfinished Tales," she added. "So I learned a lot about lots of the mess that the elves made in the First and Second Age and that was kind of the key.
"And I was trying to find what would it mean to be a younger elf, and I think it's the arrogance of not learning yet that you don't have all the answers. And I think also the most wise and serene people I know usually went through quite a lot to get there."
Meanwhile, Aramayo explained that he did not "consciously" incorporate any of Weaving's mannerisms into his performance, in part because there are so many changes in the intervening years between the series and the iconic film trilogy.
"He's different, he's young," he explained. "And he's at the beginning of the things that will make him the Elrond in the Council of Elrond or something. So he's got a lot to go through."
Additional reporting by Steve O'Brien.
The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power episodes 1 and 2 arrive on Amazon Prime Video in the UK on Friday 2nd September 2022 – you can sign up now for a free 30-day Prime Video trial.
If you’re looking for something else to watch in the meantime, check out our TV Guide or visit our dedicated Fantasy hub.
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Authors
Patrick Cremona is the Senior Film Writer at Radio Times, and looks after all the latest film releases both in cinemas and on streaming. He has been with the website since October 2019, and in that time has interviewed a host of big name stars and reviewed a diverse range of movies.
