Two done – one to go… and with The Hobbit: Battle of The Five Armies due in cinemas in December, it looks as though the end is almost in sight. But what should we expect? Scottish actor Billy Connolly teases some details from the upcoming Hobbit sequel.
“It’s hair-raising,” Connolly told Yahoo! Movies UK about the titular battle. “It’s actually quite frightening to do. The sheer noise of it, when they’re all attacking us, noises that are foreign to you.”
Playing Dain II Ironfoot, Billy Connolly joins the star-studded cast as they venture into the final stretch of their adventure. And it seems the eventual King Under The Mountain rather liked Peter Jackson’s methods.
Explaining that Jackson pipes in the sounds of the enemy on set, Connolly admitted that it had quite the effect. “It gets the reaction from you,” says the actor. And some of the scenes even took him aback.
“I watched all my dwarf friends coming down the river in barrels and they were actually doing it,” he said. “They’d made a river and [there were] real barrels…I was scared, it was astonishing.”
Of course, fans of The Hobbit will know that Connolly’s character eventually becomes the King Under The Mountain under rather tragic circumstances… and alongside James Nesbitt, it seems he’s putting his Scottish accent to good use.
Connolly revealed that he’ll be speaking Dwarvish on screen in his trademark Glaswegian accent… and apparently, he learned the weird mish-mashed dialect on set, before instantly forgetting how to do it. Rather convenient, eh?
But how was his experience as Dain II Ironfoot? It looks as though he wasn’t exactly a fan of the costume…
“It’s like wearing a Volkswagen,” he said. “[It took] three hours a day [to apply]. Can you imagine, having your face stuck on? It’s extraordinary the way I look. My eyebrows have got braids in them, jewellery in my beard, tattoos on my forehead. If you’re standing and you’ve got iron boots on and a big axe, it gives you a certain cachet. You’re not going to say, ‘excuse me, can you tell me the time, please?’”
Although Billy Connolly is no stranger to the big screen, the 71-year-old actor admits that fantasy epic aren’t exactly something he’s used to… especially when it comes to the fans.
“When I was younger I used to meet ‘Lord Of The Rings’ people and I always disliked them,” he admitted. “Always talking about ginks and gonks and googlewooglies – get the f**k out of the my face.”
But these days, it looks as though he’s a bit more sympathetic. “They come up with the big leatherbound versions of [the book],” he said. “You have to do a really nice autograph because it’s forever. It’s not like a brochure they throw in the corner.”
Thankfully, he seems to have calmed with age when it comes to Lord of the Rings fans… quite a good thing, considering he’s likely to be invited to the premiere. But will he be any good as Dain II Ironfoot? For now, we’ll have to wait and see.
Are you looking forward to The Hobbit: Battle of the Five Armies? Will Billy Connolly steal the show? Let us know what you think in the comments below…
