Andy Serkis was told not to play Gollum in 'Lord Of The Rings'

Andy Serkis almost turned down the role of Gollum in Lord Of The Rings, after one of his co-stars in Oliver Twist told him it wouldn’t be worth his time.

Serkis made this admission to Josh Gad as part of his recent Reunited Apart series, which saw the English actor reunite with his former Lord of The Rings cast members.

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“It was an interesting one. Because when I first heard from my agent this was happening, it was just like, ‘Andy, look, they’re doing this amazing kind of film of Lord of the Rings down in New Zealand. They’d like to see you for a voice for a digital character.’ I was like, ‘A what?’”

Serkis was clearly intrigued by the part of Gollum and working with the motion capture technology. So much so that he decided to run it by one of his co-stars at the time.

“I remember I was in Prague working on an adaptation of Oliver Twist actually and I said to this other actor I was working with, ‘I think I may be going down to New Zealand to do this digital character.’ He said, ‘Well, is your face going to be on screen?’ I said, ‘No, it’s not.’ He said, ‘Mate, I wouldn’t touch it with a barge pole.’”

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Obviously Serkis is rather glad that he didn’t listen to this actor. The part of Gollum turned him into one of the most lauded actors of his generation, as well as and the go to actor for performance capture roles, too.

Serkis would also go on to play the role of Gollum in all three Lord Of The Rings films, while he would even reprise it for The Hobbit: And Unexpected Journey, too.