I feel borderline disrespectful using that lovely line from Sam on my own cheap and nasty memoirs, but it came to me straight away – which rarely happens with these titles! And it fits. I am indeed back, having not written one of these for just shy of a full year. Unlike Master Gamgee I was not farewelling a friend at the Grey Havens, rather I have been giving all of my free time to the recording heaps of songs for one of my musical projects, The Snow Ponies. After writing barely any music for about eight years somebody suddenly turned the tap back on and I absolutely had to make the most of it! It’s still on, but I’ve finished an album and the tap is now flowing more manageably. So, I thought I’d better have a crack at finishing the City Guard diaries.
I started writing these at the end of 2023, although I feel it’s fully on-brand for a Tolkien-related project to drag on far longer than anticipated. I had to read back over all the previous installments to remind me of what I had and hadn’t told, which I suspect Tolkien himself had to do on more than one occasion. With his own books I mean, not these blogs. Dear god, I dread to think what he’d think of these. Anyway, at least I don’t have to search through piles of paper covered in barely legible faded handwriting.
So where were we? Well, Númenor. I’m a City Guard, and we’ve filmed a few scenes with key characters Galadriel, Pharazôn, Míriel, Elendil and Isildur. We’re at the end of the Second Age, and working out the story they’re trying to tell is nigh on impossible for any number of reasons. That won’t necessarily change after the show airs either <cough>. Although with the benefit of seeing season one, I realise that much of what I we filmed was done in the reverse order of the story, and the majority of the story wasn’t being told on Númenor anyway. While I’m still struggling to work out what the hell is going on, I’m not so bothered anymore, I’m just enjoying the experience.
One thing I did find out was that the City Guard, who I think we can all agree were one of the highlights of the show, perhaps THE highlight, were initially only planned to be used on the big scene at the docks that we did on my first day. But apparently we looked so great on camera that the director started using in us in pretty much everything in that storyline and we ended up being on and off set regularly over about three months of filming. Guards came and went, but there was a core of us that were there throughout which was really nice.
“I’m just saying my lady, I don’t think my costume is as good as those guards”
“Do not be afraid Elendil. You are not alone”
I’ve said previously that I would introduce you to the City Guard, and now feels an appropriate time. Unfortunately we are now more than five years on from filming and I’m struggling to remember everyone! I have mentioned Luke, who was paired up with me for the scenes at the docks. He disappeared after a couple of weeks, having used up all his leave and having to return to his day job. I later worked with him on the Netflix series Sweet Tooth, which was a lovely reunion. We have also already met my fellow parade leader Mick. Mick and I bonded over a mutual love for Terry Pratchett and snacks, a solid foundation for friendship if ever there was one, and many long days were made much more enjoyable for having Mick to talk rubbish with.
Stew was the longest serving Guard. He’d been there two days before everyone else for a scene requiring just one guard, so he had a natural seniority in the group. This also meant that all the ADs knew him by name, so every time they came looking for a guard/guards they’d be like “ok I need three guards… Stew, you and you” or “we need a guard… Stew, come on”. During one of his many solo jobs the rest of us came up with an idea for a spin-off show for the City Guards. The show would be based on the premise of the courageous City Guard solving crimes around the city of Armenelos, but every week Stew would do all the work and solve the crime – while the rest of us sat around the guard house eating snacks and talking bollocks. The Tolkien adaptation nobody asked for, but everyone needs.
Stew was entirely the opposite from myself in that he didn’t want to know anything whatsoever about the tales the show was based on as he didn’t want any spoilers. On more than one occasion he ran away from the Guards’ table in the holding tent with his hands over his ears shouting “I can’t hear you” while I Tolkiensplained to anyone willing to listen.
We have also already met Trevor – he was the dude that took a nap on set while the rest of us stood around for hours trying to line up the huge scene in the city trapezoid. Trevor barely said a word to anyone the entire time. Despite the very strictly enforced ban on devices for any extras, Trevor would brazenly sit there in the tent with his laptop or phone. He ignored nearly all direction on set and basically seemed to just hang around doing whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted. Yet somehow nobody ever queried this. Weird.
Dieter & Rolf were our two German guards, both of whom had the nerve to be clean shaven and in good physical shape. Dieter was notable for regularly reducing us to tears with hilarious stories, which more often than not seemed to end up with Dieter being involved in an unfortunate poo-related accident. I ended up doing quite a lot of scenes with Dieter, and we were consistently being reprimanded by the ADs for giggling uncontrollably at inopportune moments.
And I mustn’t forget Dave, another guard whom I later saw on Sweet Tooth as well as Aquaman 2! Dave was a friendly Maori dude, and he knew everyone by name. I don’t mean all the guards, I mean everyone on set. Everyone. He was around all the time, but you’d never see him for long as he was always off talking to someone else. It wasn’t until right at the end that I thought to ask Dave if he had any idea what was going on at the other locations, and he promptly spent twenty minutes giving me an overview of pretty much the entire plot. Doh.