SCENE-STEALERS

They didn’t wield Andúril, or the Elder Wand, but these actors took titchy roles and made them count. We salute them

It’s not all about your Harrys and your Aragorns. We talk to the some of the key supporting players who ran off with scenes from both Potter and Rings movies.

THE MOUTH OF SAURON (BRUCE SPENCE)

Only those who have seen the Lord Of The Rings Extended Editions will have witnessed Sauron’s toothiest servant in action. But once seen, he’s never forgotten. “He’s in need of floss,” says Bruce Spence, who played him. “His breath would be utterly appalling. I’m sure no partner is in love with him. Although you never know what his wife might look like.”

Spence was already in New Zealand, touring with a production of Les Misérables in which he was playing Thénardier, when he got the summons to don a gigantic, spiky helmet for a climactic encounter in The Return Of The King. For his one-day scene in which Mordor agitator The Mouth of Sauron parlays with Gandalf and Aragorn, Spence had to contend with a few handicaps. “I was up at 3.30am and my brain was a bit scrambled from being handed a rewrite. Then there was the fact I really couldn’t see out of the helmet, and my horse didn’t like the armour. I had to ride out of the gates, nice and majestic and intimidating, while I had a horse that was trying to toss this armour off its head.”

Despite the stress, and the fact he didn’t make the big screen, Spence is proud of his megamouthed villain, who has even inspired some disturbing cosplay. “He looks offensive,” he sums up, “but that was the objective.” NICK DE SEMLYEN

OLIVER WOOD (SEAN BIGGERSTAFF)

The older kids at school always seem cooler — especially when they’re Gryffindor Quidditch captain. Fifth-year Oliver Wood is the one to teach Harry the rules of the ultimate wizarding sport — though actor Sean Biggerstaff can’t recall them anymore. “I remember that they don’t make any earthly sense!” he laughs. “The catching of the Snitch basically renders the entire rest of the game a waste of everyone’s time.” If it all looks magical on screen, the reality was anything but. “I absolutely beat the hell out myself,” he remembers. “The Bludger was cast iron, it was really heavy. Pretending it had a life of its own meant I battered it against my own chest. I was covered in bruises and a complete wreck the next day.” BEN TRAVIS

REG CATTERMOLE (STEFFAN RHODRI)

It’s a unique acting challenge to be the other person to play Ron Weasley. But for Steffan Rhodri — best known to Gavin & Stacey fans as ‘Dave Coaches’ — his role as Reg Cattermole, the Ministry Of Magic employee whose form Ron Weasley assumes with Polyjuice Potion in Deathly Hallows — Part 1, had the best possible blueprint.

“David Yates, the director, got Rupert Grint and the other actors to record the scenes in a studio,” Rhodri recalls. “Weeks before we were due on set, we had a DVD of them so I could study Rupert’s body language, his facial gestures.” Rhodri also studied the “nuances and intonations” of Grint’s voice — though in the end, his dialogue was overdubbed by Grint’s. “Which,” he adds with a laugh, “I didn’t find out until the premiere.” JOHN NUGENT

FARMER MAGGOT (CAMERON RHODES)

Cameron Rhodes auditioned for Saruman but failed to secure the wizard’s staff. Then, during pick-ups for The Fellowship Of The Ring, the New Zealander was cast to play the wonderfully named Farmer Maggot in a scene where Maggot and his dog are terrified by a Ringwraith.

“The dog was a famous one, named

Hercules,” says Rhodes. “He’d done a Toyota ad. And he did the scene perfectly.” Rhodes, on the other hand, found himself struggling to muster up the requisite fear. “It’s hard to look terrified of a piece of green tape on the side of a camera!” he laughs. “I was thinking, ‘They’re gonna recast.’ But on take 12, it happened. I started shaking and was still shaking an hour later.” And cinema’s greatest Maggot was born. NICK DE SEMLYEN

BEM (EKOW QUARTEY) HARRY POTTER

Under Hogwarts’ roof, Ekow Quartey was Bem, a Gryffindor student in the same year as Harry, Hermione and Ron. In the real world, however, he became known as “the ominous kid from Harry Potter”, mostly among his friends, who used him as a wingman at university to pick up girls.

The 30-year-old, who got the part after casting director Jina Jay visited his school, earned his title from a scene in The Prisoner Of Azkaban — during a divination class with Emma Thompson’s Professor Trelawney, Bem correctly recognises the omen of death in Harry’s tea leaves. “Imagine everyone chilling and then this 11-year-old says, ‘By the way, everyone, you’re gonna die,’” laughs Quartey. “You’d think, ‘Is this kid okay? Does he need a hug?’” BETH WEBB

ROSIE COTTON (SARAH MCLEOD) THE LORD OF THE RINGS (EXTENDED EDITIONS)

Mcleod played a 1920s starlet in Peter Jackson’s 1995 mockumentary Forgotten Silver. Not that that put her on the inside track to become future Mrs Gamgee Rosie Cotton. “It was the normal casting process,” she says — though she was seven months pregnant when she got the part (her daughter Maisie, now 21, would end up playing baby Frodo Gamgee). “I think I just probably had that right sort of chubby face. Luckily a good look for being a hobbit.”

Rosie embodied everything Sam, Frodo and the Fellowship were fighting to protect; something that means a lot to Mcleod to this day. “It still makes me cry when Sam says, ‘If I could have married anyone, I would have married Rosie.’” Though she now runs her own voice-actor agency, Bigmouth, she’s never left the hairy-toed Ms Cotton behind. She’s still in regular touch with screen husband Sean Astin, not to mention Rings fans, for whom she often records video messages. “I feel really fortunate,” she says, “to be in the position to share a little bit of Rosie joy with others.” DAN JOLIN

MRS PROUDFOOT (MEGAN EDWARDS) THE LORD OF THE RINGS

Megan Edwards’ lone line as respectable Hobbiton lady Mrs Proudfoot — “That were a lucky escape!” — was excised from Fellowship, but happily an iconic comic beat made it in, Proudfoot glaring at her husband Odo (Noel Appleby) when he pauses to admire Gandalf’s fireworks. “There was a pig in a pen,” Edwards recalls, “in this tiny little space next to the hobbit hole I came out of. I don’t think you ever see the pig, but it helped a lot. That was the bit that ended up in the film, the grumpy harrumph. It was chilly but just lovely.” HELEN O’HARA

LEE JORDAN (LUKE YOUNGBLOOD) HARRY POTTER

Luke Youngblood’s favourite scene as Lee Jordan — Gryffindor student and Quidditch commentator — involved commentating Harry’s first Quidditch match. “I was screaming at the top of my lungs at this green-screen,” he laughs. “James and Oliver [Phelps, aka George and Fred Weasley] were waiting outside saying, ‘If he’s doing that, what are we going to have to do?’”

Youngblood remains friends with the Phelps, but most importantly, he feels that playing Lee Jordan gave hope to future actors. “To be one of the few Black people in the movie was major in my community,” he says. “It’s been so nice to have people say to me, ‘Seeing you up there made me know I could do this.’” BETH WEBB

ROMILDA VANE (ANNA SHAFFER) HARRY POTTER

It’s quite a feat, for an actor to make an impact despite having — let’s count — zero lines. “I’m just hanging out looking creepy in the background,” laughs Anna Shaffer. Romilda crushes on Harry in Half-blood Prince and in a hilarious close-up gives him doe eyes. “I was nervous,” says Shaffer, “but Daniel and Emma were great, and David Yates gave the scene this cheekiness.”

She did a lot with a little. “Even though I didn’t have any lines I was treated as an important part of this huge machine. That’s what the whole thing was like — little things that added up to make it this incredible project.” ALEX GODFREY

COLIN CREEVEY (HUGH MITCHELL) HARRY POTTER

Colin Creevey, a puppy in boy form, stans Harry Potter. When he meets him, it all spills out. And in Hugh Mitchell, the crew found the perfect kid. He originally tested for Hufflepuffer Justin Finch-fletchley, but meeting this wide-eyed 11-year-old, the crew knew what to do. “Colin was this crazy, excitable kid who’s a little bit annoying,” laughs Mitchell. “I think I had a certain nervous energy!”

For his first few days he was thrust into a blue-screen Quidditch world. “It was nerveracking,” says Mitchell, “but I just went with it.” Then it was time for Colin to meet Harry. Mitchell once more went for it, but Chris Columbus wanted him bigger. “He encouraged me to be a bit crazy. He was ramping it up: ‘More energy! More excitement!’” He got that: Colin Creevey is on one. ALEX GODFREY

GOTHMOG (LAWRENCE MAKOARE) THE LORD OF THE RINGS (EXTENDED EDITIONS)

His face all but falling off, The Return Of The King’s orc captain Gothmog is a particularly gruff baddie, yelling and shoving indiscriminately, spitting at boulders. Peter Jackson gave Lawrence Makoare no backstory. “He just told me I was playing a deformed orc. He wanted him clumsy.” Makoare was studying martial arts so was comfortable with the physicality — Gothmog has a limp and an unusable arm — as well as the smelly prosthetics (“The sweat just soaks into them”).

On Youtube there’s a video in Gothmog’s honour, calling him “the most charismatic Mordor orc”. “That’s an honour,” laughs Makoare. But he’s most proud of the pus. “[Make-up artist] Bill Hunt would get this bottle of yellow pus to come out of different orifices of Gothmog’s face and I’d say, ‘I want more! More pus!’ I was a very pus-y orc!” ALEX GODFREY