HobbitCon 3: Third Time's a Charm

Ken Stott & Graham McTavish (Balin & Dwalin)

Graham McTavish made quite an impression during the opening ceremony. As his name was announced, the tall bearded Scot entered the stage, and the audience swooned: the actor was wearing a kilt! He did the same at the closing ceremony (one of the neighbors whispered «If he comes out in a kilt now…») — which he did! At the convention itself McTavish refrained from wearing the kilt, wearing normal pants instead. Still, his popularity with the fans was unbroken, especially at the bar where he was partying with Jed Brophy and visited the dance floor very often.

Ken Stott didn’t visit the dance floor, but he was received as heartily as last year. And while at HobbitCon 2014 he was a bit reserved and shy, he was clearly glad to be there this time around, announcing at the opening: «I don’t do cons. But HobbitCon… I couldn’t say no to that!» He had a common panel with Graham McTavish where they were answering the fans’ questions.

Our question to them was: would McTavish and Stott like to hear the foreign dubbed versions of their performances. The dwarves answered:

Graham McTavish: Of course! Any actor is interested in that.

Ken Stott: I’d be interested in how I sound in German!

Graham McTavish: I’d like to hear the Japanese Dwalin! I’ve heard the Spanish one, but none of the others. Could someone do a German Dwalin for us?

A girl from the audience, with a high-pitched voice: «Nicht kürzer, aber schlauer!»

Ken Stott: Your voice seems to have gone up!

About the relationship between Thorin and Dwalin:

Graham McTavish: My approach for the part was like this: I always believed Thorin and Dwalin actually grew up together, played as children together, spent all their lives together.

About the regal armor and why the dwarves didn’t wear it in battle:

— It was beautiful! But in a practical battle we couldn’t have worn it. We decided that we’d take the armor off, because it was basically a suicide mission! We couldn’t have hoped to survive that!

— What was your weirdest experience during audition for a part?

Graham McTavish: There is no experience in the history of the world compared to Adam’s audition. [See below for details on that…]
Well, commercials, they are a rich vein of hilarity and humiliation.

Ken Stott: Long time ago, I was a very young actor. I went for the audition and did the usual. And the director asked me: «Can you be a fried egg for me? Show me a fried egg!»
And I started to get angry: «I don’t care how you like your eggs, fried or scrambled. I will not be your fried egg!» And I stormed out. When I got home, my agent called me and said: «You’ve got the job.»

Graham McTavish: I didn’t tell it before, but I actually auditioned for the musical of The Hobbit. They wanted me to sing, and I learned the song «I Like Rhythm» — the female part! And they said to me: «You have a wonderful voice that’s struggling to get out!»

On different dialects of the dwarves:

Graham McTavish: I always imagined that we, the dwarves, spread around the world, and that’s the reason for us to have different dialects.

Ken Stott: Yeah, and we were waiting in the different parts of the world to be invited to Bilbo for dinner.

— What would your character do with his share of the treasure?

Ken Stott: I like to think they’d give some of it to the people of Laketown… a percentage.

Graham McTavish: I always imagine, Dwalin would go to have a solitary quiet life, being a recluse, in a quiet place in the country.

Ken Stott: Balin would spend a lot of time thinking of what to do with it, how to spend it well.

— Did it sadden you to shave off your mohawk?

Graham McTavish: It’s not so much the thought of shaving it off, but of losing it. I can imagine everybody from Erebor coming up to me: «What happened to your mohawk?» And I: «I LOST IT!!!»

— Were there practical jokes on set?

Graham McTavish: I always thought the filmmakers were often joking. When they were coming to us, saying «Let’s put you in a barrel and pour fish all over your head!» I was thinking «They could not be serious!»

Ken Stott: About practical jokes… we were mostly concentrating on how to kill ourselves.

Graham McTavish: Martin [Freeman] – is naughty. And Ian McKellen is very naughty. Whenever the camera wasn’t on him, he used to call Martin «Dildo Diggins», to make us laugh.

— How did your acting career start?

Graham McTavish: Actually, I was going to be a pilot. My father was a pilot, and after college I was going to get a pilot license, to eventually go into civil aviation like my dad. And I did it right before getting accidentally asked to be in a play.
What attracted me in a pilot’s profession? It was glamorous back then: you had a great costume, you traveled around the world and met beautiful women. Then I noticed how shallow I was!

Ken Stott: Before becoming an actor I was a singer in a band. I liked it very much. I probably would have done that if I hadn’t become an actor!

— Can you watch yourself in a movie?

Ken Stott: I still can get irritated. I know there is a boom mike above the frame. You still can see it, you still can tell how easy or hard this scene was to shoot. That often gets in a way, I still feel this boom in the frame.

Graham McTavish: It is a rare opportunity, when you can just see the truth of a scene, when you are totally transported into the scene. That’s amazing!

Adam Brown, Jed Brophy, Mark Hadlow, Stephen Hunter (Ori, Nori, Dori, Bombur)

HobbitCon founding members Adam Brown, Jed Brophy, Mark Hadlow and Stephen Hunter had several group panels together as well as with other actors; additionally, Brophy, Hunter & Hadlow were joined by Peter Hambleton for the «Dwarves Comedy Hour» where they improvised various sketches, harassed an accidental member of the audience and shaved Mark Ferguson:

Jed Brophy was as always in great physical shape, in spite of his 52 years-old age. Time and again he demonstrated the marvels of his fitness, either by breakdancing or by raising his legs higher than John Cleese in his «Ministry of Silly Walks». And he always was an inexhaustible source of good mood and spontaneous humor.

Adam Brown was true to his image as the boy whom you’d love to feed some milk and cookies. He was most puzzled at questions about his Ori character: as he is now shooting the fifth installment of «Pirates of the Caribbean», Adam has already left Ori behind. Still, much to the excitement of the audience, Adam continued sharing the embarrassing and hilarious facts from his biography.

Stephen Hunter felt like a fish in the water: no matter if he was at a Q&A panel or at the bar, the sturdy dwarf in a «Team Bombur» T-Shirt was always cool and clearly enjoying the happenings.

Mark Hadlow was only there for two out of three days of the convention: on Wednesday he already had to appear onstage in New Zealand, so he had to fly home on Sunday evening. Still, he said goodbye to the audience by delivering a touching performance of an aria from «Turandot» in an excellent singing voice.

At the closing ceremony he said goodbye once again — this time, in a rather hilarious way. He recorded a video message from the airport where he blamed — who else? — Adam Brown, who «is not as cute as you think he is!» Here is this video message:

A question about the craziest fan encounter:

Jed Brophy: This winter I was literally chased by fans in the streets of Los Angeles. I was walking down a street and suddenly found out there were people running after me. I thought they were following someone else and halted to let them through. And then I found out they were chasing me!

Adam Brown: It was during the premiere of the first «Hobbit» in Wellington. I was walking along the red carpet, signing autographs, and suddenly I see that I am signing a cabbage! Someone held it out to me for signing!

— A question for Jed: is it true you used to like breakdancing?

Instead of answering, Jed momentarily starts breakdancing on the stage.

Adam Brown: Sometimes I think Jed is actually CGI.

— People are now fans of your characters in «The Hobbit». Are you fans of any fandom yourselves?

Jed Brophy: I used to be a bit geeky about Star Wars. Actually, I used to think that «Jedi» was about me. My parents used to call me «Jedy» when I was little.

Adam Brown: I don’t recall being geeky about anything. Except I’m quite into food. I am very picky when going to dinner. If there are several restaurants in the same street I have to check them all out and compare the menus.

On Adam Brown’s part in «Pirates of the Caribbean 5»:

Adam Brown: I am just filming it in Australia. It’s a high budget production, very professional, quite like «The Hobbit». And I don’t wear prosthetic makeup, which is great!

How hard it was being Dori:

Mark Hadlow: It’s very difficult. One of the brothers is naughty and one is totally dependent!

— The famous «Scene 88». Would you repeat this experience for any money in the world?

Adam Brown: I ran the London Marathon. And I would do it 4 times before I do Scene 88 again!!

Jed Brophy: I would do Scene 88…. for all money in the world!

Mark Hadlow: Scene 88… the never ending story!

Stephen Hunter: I’d do it, for just a few thousand dollars!

Mark Ferguson: You cannot, because Jed already does it for all the money in the world!

— Did the dwarves visit Bilbo afterwards?

Jed Brophy: Oh yeah we did! We taught little Frodo to smoke pipeweed. We’re very naughty!

The group of dwarves got asked a question if they learned anything in German while staying in Bonn:

Jed Brophy: „Ja! Sehr gut!“ (Yes! Very good!)

Mark Hadlow: „Guten Abend!“ (Good evening!)

Peter Hambleton: „Danke!“ (Thanks!)

Stephen Hunter: I’ve learned some useful words. „Guten Abend! Guten Tag! Morgen! Danke! Hefeweizen!“ (Good evening! Good day! Good morning! Thanks! An unfiltered beer!»)

Adam Brown, reading on a sheet of paper: „Ich… bin… sehr… geil!“ (I am very horny!)

(laughter)

Adam Brown: I thought it means «I’m happy to be here!»

A question for Stephen Hunter: if Bombur had lines of dialogue, what dialect would he have?

Stephen Hunter: It definitely would be Northern Irish accent, because of Jimmy Nesbitt. It’s the only dialect Jimmy can do.

When asked about special face expressions for photo ops Mark Hadlow warped his own face into something indefinitely hilarious, which he calls his «stupid photo face»:

Jed Brophy showed his «perfect photo face»:

Stephen Hunter showed his special photo ops smile:

Once again, there was a question about the craziest experience in an actor’s audition. Mark Hadlow revealed a rather weird one:

Mark Hadlow: I did an audition for the film «The End of the Golden Weather». An I somehow hadn’t been doing it right. And the director said «Get out of here!» and kicked me in the bum! That was very weird.

Still, the main prize for the most hilarious and strange story about an audition went to Adam Brown:

— I was auditioning for a commercial. The commercial should go like this: a rider gets off his horse, says to it «I’ll do it alone» and runs by himself. There was a running machine there and I was given a riding hat. And I didn’t know how to use a running machine. I stepped onto it and they said «You have to turn it on». I turned it on and started running. And as I am running, I see that the casting director is pissing himself with laughing. Then he stopped laughing and started talking on the phone. And I was still running. They had warned me: «You’ll have to run a lot in this role.» Anyway, after the audition I went out, sat on the sidewalk at Oxford Street and just passed out. And then I woke up and it was 3 hours later, and I actually woke up because they were calling me on my mobile. Then they said to me: «We need our riding hat back!»