Shadow's Return of the One Party Report

It is my pleasure to inform you that I am no longer considering changing the name of this section to “Everything but a Hobbit Encounter”, because I have finally seen hobbits!!  YAY!!  And they are just as adorable as I’ve been told!!  But alas, I am skipping ahead here, and should start at the beginning. 
 

Sunday dawned bright and sunny in Hollywood, California, as we looked out on the morning from our hotel on Highland Avenue, two blocks from the Kodak theater.  Everything was hustle and bustle, everywhere you looked, as folks began to get ready for the day’s festivities.  My partner in crime, Marea, and I went across the street to the Holiday Inn to grab some breakfast before heading out to get beautiful. 

The Holiday Inn looked much like the Comfort Inn where we were staying—bursting at the seams with eager Tolkien fans in town for The One Party!!  Scattered Tolkien t-shirts and buttons identified our compatriots, and so we hooked up with two fellow Tolkien fans, Sandy and Walt, and shared breakfast in the crowded dining room.  Quite a few TORn staffers that we knew were also having breakfast there, so we got the low-down as to how the preparations were proceeding, and were happy to hear that everything was almost ready to go!! 

Our excitement mounted as our friend Cam picked us up after breakfast.  Marea and I had both decided that since we’d come all this way and bought the fancy dresses, we wanted the whole nine yards as far as our Oscar look was concerned.  So, we had both our hair and makeup done at a local mall in preparation for the evening.  Then it was time to race home and get dressed, because the party opened its doors at 3 PM and it was already 2:30!!  We donned dresses, jewelry, and shoes in record time, and met up with our friend Serai before heading for the party. 

The American Legion building was right across the street from the hotel, and as we crossed we noticed the line of fancily clad and costumed fans lining the block all the way to and around the corner from the Legion building.  Oy!  It was going to be a long wait!  But…luckily we saw the VIP entrance and inquired if there was also a special entrance for press.   We were rewarded by being ushered along the side of the building to a press check-in area.  My badge was found and issued quickly enough, but there was no press badge for Marea!  We explained to the woman that Marea was my photographer, and that this was all set up in advance…but we didn’t seem to be getting anywhere!  At this point, Monty Mickelson, the press director for the event, walked up and was briefed of our problem.  Luckily, he recognized Marea’s name and located it under the freelance press list!  This was bizarre, as Marea had applied as freelance press but had never received a response from the press agency, but we snapped up her pass and breathed a collective sigh of relief over the averted disaster.  We then received our press kits, and were told the layout for the party. 

The red carpet (which was actually blue) was along the side of the building there in front of us, covered with a tent-like structure and displaying a One Party banner, and the press area was behind a set of railings in front of the carpet and close to the building.  The VIP area for the party was a large party tent behind the Legion building that could be reached by going through the press area.  We filed these details away for later, and headed through the side door and into the main party. 

As we stepped over the threshold, we were absorbed into the heart of LOTR fandom!  Elves and hobbits mingled in cozy little groups and Tolkien fans decked in Oscar finery flitted to and fro as new friends were made and soulmates were reunited…and the air hummed with excitement and anticipation of what the night would hold!   A large gold hologram of the One Ring rotated slowly against the rear wall, casting a yellow glow over the dimly-lit room.  We realized that we were in a large auditorium, with rows of chairs set up on the floor and stadium seating along the sides and rear, and a large raised stage at the front.  Gollum crouched on the right-hand side of the stage, keeping watch over the revelers, and a large projection screen spanned floor to ceiling behind him in anticipation of the Oscar telecast.  Stairs at the back of the room invited us to explore the rest of the party, so we made our way to the front lobby.

Aragorn, Legolas, and Eowyn, among others, peered down at us from the balcony of the lobby and a large poster/card lined one wall, where party-goers bent to scribe their messages to Peter.  A table was set up at the front of the lobby for raffles, t-shirt sales, and picture sign-ups, so we immediately joined the rapidly growing line and purchased our One Party shirts and picture pass.  Our friend Serai joined us at this point, having just made it through the main guest line, and we headed down the stairs to the lower level of the party to the Green Dragon.  In the dim passageway to the Dragon we ducked through a haze of spiderwebs, and met a hobbit-size cousin of Shelob crouching in the corner!  What atmosphere!  We dispensed with our formal photo in the Dragon, and were drawn by the wonderful aromas coming from Mordor (imagine!)  to grab some dinner.

Mordor was a large room on the lower level, with projection equipment set up to broadcast both the Oscar telecast and the doings up in the main auditorium.  Buffet tables lined two walls, and we chose from a wonderful spread of salads, pastas, vegetables, chicken and prime rib!  Way to go, TORn!  We trooped our dinner back up to the main auditorium and snagged seats in the last row of chairs on the main floor.  This allowed us convenient access to the press area, as we were about 30 feet from the press door, and also allowed us easy mobility, as we could scoot the chairs back and jump up at will.  By this time, the pre-Oscar show was being telecast, and the eager crowd sent up a whoop every time anyone associated with Lord of the Rings was shown onscreen.  Even if the shot just panned past Elijah, the roar would go up anew.  It was amazing!! 

I wish I could say that I sat and watched the Oscar telecast with rapt attention, but there was just entirely too much else going on!  Marea and I both had many friends and acquaintances present, and also some networking that we wanted to do, so we took turns popping up from our seats and chasing down people we needed to talk to! 

And then the Oscar count began to grow…four, five, six, seven…we were glued to our seats now, jittering with hope and anticipation.  The roar was deafening every time our beloved crew rose to accept an award, and the party crowd was on their feet and screaming so loud that it was hard to hear some of the speeches!  I cannot even describe to you the absolutely incredible feeling of being in the midst of a thousand screaming Tolkien fans as ROTK thundered to its 11-award tally.  It was one of the most amazing experiences of my life!  I remember turning to Serai somewhere around eight and saying “Oh my God, we’re going to take them all!”  And we both jumped up and down and squeed like rabid fangirls! 

And then Peter won for director, and the hidden canons on the sides of the auditorium fired ticker tape into the air to rain down on the hysteria below.  The cheers went up long and loud, and we all stood through Peter’s speech!  One more award to go!  The air was electric as Steven Spielberg (!!!) was introduced and he approached the podium to announce the winner for Best Picture.  We bounced in place, we clenched our fists, we didn’t even breathe for the amount of time it took for Mr. Spielberg to announce the winner (hurry UP, Steven!)…and then it was pandemonium!!  The place went WILD.  Shouting, screaming, kissing, hugging, tears…the climax of three years and more spent watching and waiting and dreaming of this moment…and it had finally arrived!  OUR cast and OUR crew had finally achieved recognition from not only legions of adoring fans, but from their peers as well!  Such joy!  Such satisfaction!  And such an immense sense of gratitude toward these individuals who, even though they don’t know me, had managed to change my life so completely! 

The celebration lasted for quite some time, but we could not afford to savor the moment any longer—we had to get out to the press area and get a spot on the railing for the celebrity arrivals!  It was COLD outside on Sunday night, I’d say somewhere in the 40’s at the most, considering the fact that you could see your breath, and Marea and I had decided that there was no point in freezing.  So, during one of my forays from my chair early on in the Oscar telecast, I scooted across the street to our hotel and fetched our coats from the room.  And let me tell you, I am SO glad I did, because we were outside for most of the rest of the evening! 

We staked out a spot at the far end of the Red Carpet, right along the blue railing.  I was within the enclosed area, while Marea was on the other side of the corner railing, to take (hopefully) better pictures, and to potentially nab any celebs who missed us.  There were several TV cameras next to us, but most of the other press had crammed into the area at the beginning of the carpet.  At the time I was not sure why, but I was to learn one of the reasons the hard way later in the evening.  And so, we waited.  We chatted up Xoanon and his girlfriend from TORn, got acquainted with the press folks around us, and were told that the LOTR crew might not arrive until around 11:30.  It was 9:30. 

But, much to our surprise and delight, the first limo pulled up at 10 PM!  John Rhys-Davies emerged with his wife and began to work the Red Carpet. We were THRILLED.  We had missed JRD at Dragon Con in the fall, when he had unexpectedly cancelled his appearance at the last minute.  We were quite smugly satisfied that we would now get to talk to him!  We snapped a few good shots of John as he inched his way toward us, and finally, he stood before me.  I extended my hand, which he accepted and immediately commented on how cold it was!  I told him we’d been standing out here for quite a while now! 
 

John Rhys-Davies Interview:
JRD Audio File (right-click and save!)

JRD: Oh, your hand is cold!

Shadow:  Yes, it is, it’s cold out here!

Marea:  We’ve been here for a long time.

Shadow:  I wanted to ask you what you thought you would like the legacy of this film to be…what you would like people to remember most from this Trilogy.

*pause*

Shadow:  Uhoh, a tough one.

JRD:  Oh, that’s a tough one, isn’t it?  Well, let me say that I think that Lord of the Rings is an exceptional book.  It is arguably the greatest work of imaginative fiction of the latter half of the 20th century.  To do justice to a great book, and a damn thick one like that, is something that film doesn’t often do.  What it shows is that with the right director, and a great and courageous series of producers behind you, that you can take a work of literature and transform it into a great work of art in another medium.  That’s very rarely done, and that’s the real legacy of this.  This is the standard which future adaptations should seek to emulate, particularly of something that is so un-cinematic like Lord of the Rings.  Tolkien did not believe that this book could ever be made into film, and we did it.  And that’s great. 

Shadow:  You did it very well, if I may say so.

JRD:  Thank you very much. 

Shadow:  Thank you.

Marea:  Your favorite line in the series?

JRD:  Don’t tell the elf! (in Gimli’s voice)

After our questions, Marea mentioned to John that I had a website, and would love to have a picture with him to post.  So, John reaches over and hugs me to his side, and as we pose for the pic, I feel a gentle kiss laid at my temple.  AAAHHHHH!!!  Kissed by JRD!!  WOW!!  This accounts for my shit-eating grin in the picture below.  *wink*

And then he’s gone, and the press area becomes quiet again as we settle in to wait.  The evening thus far has been amazing, and I’ve just been kissed by one of the principal actors in LOTR, so I was…a bit flustered.  I had plenty of time to get over it, though, because we waited at least another half hour for the next limo to pull up.

In the meantime, the folks from Ringers: Lord of the Fans did the Red Carpet, and we got a nice interview and photos with Carlene, Cliff, and Josh, some of the principal players in the filming of this Lord of the Rings documentary.

Ringers: Lord of the fans interview:

Shadow:  What has been your most memorable moment on this journey all the way through Lord of the Rings fandom over the last three years?

Cliff:  I think the most memorable thing for us was when our production team had the chance to go down to New Zealand to see something with our naked eyes, to see something in first person, that we had seen on film.  You know, my hat is always off to Andrew Lesnie, for photographing New Zealand, and making it look so gorgeous on film.  When we were there filming our documentary in New Zealand, we actually stepped foot out there in these vast mountains, the huge Southern Alps going across the horizon, and we realized that we were on some other planet.  It felt like some other time and it was the Age of Wonder.  I never would have thought I would physically be in a place so beautiful and so impressive.  I was STUNNED by New Zealand, I really was.

Carlene:  Mine is…when we were in New Zealand, we were at the Wellington premiere and we were at the press junket.  It was a surreal moment when we were to interview Peter Jackson and all the actors from the film, and our first interview was Peter Jackson.  Cliff and I are sitting there waiting to go in to see Peter, and Peter is walking into his room and he turns and he sees Cliff and he says “Oh, there’s Cliff!” and then he walks in.  And Cliff and I both went (jaws drop).  Peter knows who we are!  And the reaction that all of the actors had when we interviewed them to Cliff and to The One Ring.net and basically to the fans.  They were so happy to see us, so happy to talk to us.  They loved our questions!  You know I’ve been a journalist for years, and you don’t get this kind of warmth from people, and they just genuinely appreciate what the fans are doing and what TORn is doing with their films.  They know that we’re not doing it for our own personal gain, we’re doing it because we just love this so much that we must share it with everyone! 

Shadow:  What motivated you guys to make this documentary?

Carlene:   Cliff and I were shooting for TORn at an art exhibit event featuring Viggo Mortensen.  We were there and waiting to be let in, and there were a bunch of fans lined up, so Cliff and I started interviewing the fans.  And I thought this was fascinating, how all these people were here, and some of these women had driven all night to see it, and not just Viggo, it was Aragorn they came to see.  They talked to us about how this had changed their lives.  And then we went in and interviewed Viggo and that was great, but I keep thinking that these people out there in line were to me much more interesting than your typical celebrity interview.  Of course now we’re getting celebrities to talk about their love of Lord of the Rings and how it’s changed their lives, and we all just geek out together.  That’s what motivated us.  We thought, this is such a big phenomenon that’s going on, someone should make a documentary about this!  And then we thought, maybe we should!

Marea:  How do you think Lord of the Rings has changed the world?

Josh:  People like my parents are seeing these movies and loving them, and wanting to read the books because of that.  For me, that’s an amazing accomplishment.  My parents don’t go to the movies that often, so for them to go see these films, to think that they’re so fantastic and just be so totally inspired by them and want to learn more about what Lord of the Rings had done in the last fifty years…it’s just incredible. 

Cliff:  One of the more distinct changes that has happened to the world because of the publication of The Lord of the Rings is that so many young people are actually bothering to pick up a book and read, which is fascinating.  Young people are not always motivated, and they’re not always given the proper guidance…sometimes they’re not given the proper chance to pick up books like this and learn something about themselves.  By reading this beautiful, beautiful morality play with all the different characters and the different levels of story-telling that Tolkien achieves, you find that young people are actually turning inward and thinking, a great deal, about this equation of good and evil and different shades of gray in between and I find that promises very good things for the younger generation underneath us, that they’ve bothered to read something that is so complicated and so psychologically and emotionally rewarding. That, I think is beautiful.

The press area immediately sprung to life as the next limo pulled up… and oh my stars!  It’s LIJ and DOM!!!!  SQUEE!!!  Or at least, that’s what I was doing in my head, because it was hardly proper to scream like the rabid fangirl I am while acting as a member of the press.  So Marea and I looked at each other and bounced in place for a few minutes til we got our composure back, and then we devoured our eye candy feast!  Dom and Lij just looked AMAZING.  Both decked out in black suits, Dom sported a wide purple tie, and Lij a skinnier black one.  And we stared.  We drank in as much hobbit boy goodness as we could; luckily they didn’t notice because they were too busy answering questions!

Dom was now standing before the woman next to me, responding to her rapid-fire questions.  He was three feet away, I could have reached out and grabbed him!  Unfortunately, I also noticed someone else close enough to reach out and grab him—his newly assigned minder from TORn.  It seems the guys were wanted in the auditorium for something (I later found out that it was to introduce World Without Sundays), and I could all but see my opportunity slipping away!  So I got her attention and asked for one question from Dom.  I got no response, but it didn’t matter anyway, because now Dom was standing in front of me!  And I asked him my question, the same one that I had asked JRD:  What do you want the legacy of these films to be?

And then I was swallowed whole by his eyes.  Mr. Monaghan gives new meaning to the term “eye contact”.  Those blue/grey babies just pierce you, and hold you spellbound while he talks to you.  He never looked away or around once while he was talking to me, he just held me with his eyes until he was finished.  Elijah had moved next to him by now, and was a scant three feet away from me, but I could do nothing while Dom talked to me but meet that intense gaze.

Dominic Monaghan Interview:
Dom Audio File (right-click and save!)

Shadow:  What do you think should be the legacy of all of this? 

Dom:   Probably the fact that hopefully people made friends through this movie, they all got together and had a shared experience, you know, through the internet and people got together and talked about the film.  We’d like them to know that we did the same.  I’m brothers with Elijah and Sean and Andy and Billy and Viggo and Ian and we’re all a family.  That would be the legacy that we carry on, that we know each other for the rest of our lives.

Other interviewer:  Will you stick with fantasy?

Dom:  No, I wouldn’t stick with fantasy, I’d probably try and move away from that pretty quickly.  Comedy?  Sure!  Billy and I are writing a script that’s going to be done in the summer, so we’ll try and do that by the end of the year…and I love American gangster flicks. 

Other interviewer:  Would you do music in the future?

Dom:  Maybe, yeah.  Who knows?  I’m a blank canvas.
 

And then it did slip away.  The minder grabbed both of my dear hobbits before I had the chance to ask for a picture, or even speak to Lij, and they were gone.  I would like to tell you that I’m not at all disappointed.  I’d like to tell you that it doesn’t matter that much.   I am ECSTATIC that I got to talk with Dom, but to be so close to speaking to Lij too, and to possibly getting a photo with both of them…I was a bit crestfallen.  I kept thinking of how I could have done things differently, what I could have said when that might have bought me the 30 seconds I craved…but an important thing I learned from this experience is that you have no time to think.  Things happen split-second, and they revolve around the luck of being in the right place at the right time, and in this instance,  I wasn’t, and that’s the way it goes.  And there was still a long evening left to come…

So the press area quieted down again, but it didn’t take long for another limo to arrive.  Ngila Dickson appeared next, Oscar in hand, but Marea and I ended up elsewhere.  A conversation with a few fellow press gals had yielded the information that the gents stationed at the VIP area were not actually checking for bracelets, and that you could walk right in!  So as Ngila arrived, Marea took off for the VIP area, and my cell phone rang three minutes later.  “Come up the hill, look like you belong there, and take a right at the potted plant” were the instructions I received, and I stood there for a few moments debating the wisdom of leaving the press area.  We had no idea who else was going to show up, but we thought our best bet for access was the VIP area, so I squeezed my way out of the press area and walked determinedly up the hill.  And entered the VIP area without so much as a look from the security guy.  SQUEE!! 

So we cruised around the VIP area checking out the spread while trying to decide what to do next.  We suspected that there were people arriving down on the Red Carpet, but we thought they would then be making their way up to the VIP area.  We were afraid that if we left the tent we wouldn’t be able to get back in, so we decided to stay where we were for the moment.  And the Oscar winners poured up the hill.  We stood at the entrance to the VIP tent with our cameras, snapping photos as Grant Major, Peter King, Jamie Selkirk, Jim Rygiel, Joe Letteri, Randall Cooke and Alex Funke all wound their way into the tent, Oscars in hand.  Waves of applause and hearty pats on the back welcomed them, and they blended into the waiting crowd to receive their accolades. 

A cheer went up as Fran entered the tent, and unfortunately I just wasn’t fast enough with the camera and I have a picture of the back of Fran’s head (which you can easily identify by the flowers in her hair *grin*). We decided to edge our way out the door of the tent so we could get a better spot, and found ourselves standing between two large ferns on the walk up to the tent.    Barrie Osborne and his wife arrived at the VIP tent next, and we snapped a picture and congratulated Barrie warmly.  And then he looks at me and says, “Do you want to hold it?” and extends his Oscar out toward me.  Do I want to HOLD it?!  I think I stammered “sure” as he placed the Oscar in my hands.  They’re much heavier than you might think--at least twenty pounds—and I held it with both hands, because the LAST thing I wanted to do was drop the guy’s Oscar!  Then I passed it to Marea, and she beheld it with the same reverence as I, before we handed it  back.  A smart person would have asked for a picture WITH Barrie while holding his Oscar, but as I explained before, all of these things are split-second, and he was gone.  But I held a LOTR Oscar!!  How COOL is that?  Richard Taylor came next, and I got a decent shot of him except for the $%#@ plant that happened to want to come between me and his face at this point, but I didn’t know that at the time so we let him pass.  Great, more plants.  And now came Peter.  We was surrounded by a flurry of people as he entered the VIP tent, and loud cheers and applause followed in his wake. 

We were about to go back into the VIP area when we heard Lij’s voice over the loudspeaker.  The actors were on the main stage!  We tore down the hill to the auditorium, and went in through the side door just off the stage.  And there we stayed, as Peter introduced every single Oscar-winning individual, and they each came up and said a few words to the crowd.  I was so swept up in the moment that it took at least ten or fifteen minutes until it occurred to me to flip on the audio recorder I was carrying.  Here is a link to the transcripts to some of the speeches, including answers to the boxers/briefs debate from Lij and Dom, a special addition to the ROTK EE DVD, and a wonderful wrap-up from Peter!  I got many lovely photos, most of which include cameos by Larry from TORn’s head and the back of Dan Hennah, but I think they turned out fairly well!

At the end of the stage presentation, Dom and Elijah claimed that Billy was somewhere on the premises, and should be along shortly.  So we ran back out the press area, discovered he was not there, but were fortunate enough to catch the LOTR crew leaving through the kitchen entrance on their way to the New Line party.  We got some photos as they left (including this nice one of Peter) and cheered them on their way to the rest of their evening.  Then we heard it—a beloved Scottish burr raised in song!  So we raced back down the hill (lots of running around, no?) and arrived in time to hear and see Billy finish his rendition of the Proclaimer’s tune “Oh Jean”.    The hobbits then left the stage to thunderous applause, so we went outside to wait for them to pull the kitchen entrance trick that the crew had pulled.  And they never came.  Their limos were still there, so we waited, hoping to rectify earlier bungles and get our interview, but STILL they didn’t come!  

In the meantime, though, more limos pulled up.  Bruce Hopkins, Sala Baker, and Lawrence Makoare had arrived!  The Red Carpet was rather empty of press by now, so we just walked right to the middle of the press area and hailed Bruce.  He remembered us from the Gathering of the Fellowship!  Bruce explained that they had been at the New Line party, having heard that that’s where Peter and co. were going first, and had obviously crossed wires with them.  Peter was now at the New Line Party, and they were here.  Bruce talked to us about his literacy project, and posed for some photos with us, as well as taking pictures of us with his camera for his website!  We thanked him very much for his time, and headed back into the auditorium as Bruce, Sala, and Lawrence headed for the stage. 

We caught the tail-end of Emerald Rose’s performance, and stood peering into the Green Room between the stage and the VIP area where the hobbits were hanging out.  Bruce, Sala, and Lawrence close the evening out onstage, and as it happened for Cinderella, the clock struck 2 and the ball was over.  Security gently cleared the auditorium of revelers, and we found ourselves out on the street bearing gift bags from the One Party.  We still believed that the hobbits were on the premises, so we headed back in through the press entrance to scope it out.  If they were there, we weren’t able to get back up the hill to see, but our trip was fruitful as we got to say goodnight and thank you to Cliff and Chris from TORn.  With stars in our eyes (and caught on our cameras), we made our way to our borrowed home in Hollywood. 

For me, this was the climax of a long time spent in the fandom, since I saw FOTR in January, 2002.  It doesn’t get any better than this!  I hope you all had a wonderful Oscar experience wherever you were, and here’s to more great movies, LOTR encounters, and fanfiction.  May the legend live on!

I would like to take this opportunity to thank TORn for putting on such an INCREDIBLE event for the fans.  You guys just continue to give and give, and I thank you for it whole-heartedly.  It was truly wonderful to reunite with all my TORn buddies from Dragon Con, and I hope to see you all in Atlanta in August!  I would also like to wave to all the new friends I met in LA:  Caminx, Serai, Euro, Elderberry Wine, Sandy, Walt, Lois, Lori, and many others I can’t even begin to name here.  Marea, we did it again!  YAY!  And Elijah, wherever you are, our day will come and I will get to tell you what a wonderful actor you are and how incredible your performance in this trilogy was!  You just wait and see!

-Shadow

LOTR Stage Presentation at the One Party

Back to Hobbit Encounters