The big-budget series, which began production in early 2020, has added Charles Edwards (The Crown), Will Fletcher (The Girl Who Fell), Amelie Child-Villiers (The Machine) and newcomer Beau Cassidy to its sprawling cast. The series, which is estimated to already cost $465 million for its first season alone, clocks in with an ensemble cast of 39.
Amazon’s LOTR will explore new storylines preceding Tolkien’s The Fellowship of the Ring. The series explores the heroic legends of the fabled Second Age of Middle-earth’s history. The epic drama is set thousands of years before the events of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. Beginning in a time of relative peace, the series follows an ensemble cast of characters, both familiar and new, as they confront the long-feared reemergence of evil to Middle-earth. From the darkest depths of the Misty Mountains, to the majestic forests of the elf-capital of Lindon, to the breathtaking island kingdom of Númenor, to the furthest reaches of the map, these kingdoms and characters will carve out legacies that live on long after they are gone.
Announced in November 2017, Amazon landed global TV rights to
The Lord of the Rings and handed out a multiple-season commitment to the series. The drama is being produced in-house at Amazon Studios alongside the Tolkien Estate and Trust, publisher HarperCollins and Warner Bros. Entertainment’s New Line Cinema. The series was technically renewed for a second season, which is basically a formality.
Sources estimate Amazon’s megadeal for
LOTR is to be for five seasons — plus a potential spinoff. Insiders put the price tag for
global rights alone to the series at $250 million and believe once things like budgets, casting and visual effects are factored in, the price tag could hit $1 billion. (Yes, $1 billion for a TV show.)
J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay (
Star Trek 4) serve as showrunners on the series based on Tolkien’s iconic fantasy novels.
J.A. Bayona (
Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom) is set to direct the first two episodes and will executive produce, along with his producing partner Belén Atienza.
Writers Gennifer Hutchison (Breaking Bad), Jason Cahill (The Sopranos) and Justin Doble (Stranger Things) are also EPs, as are Lindsey Weber (10 Cloverfield Lane), Bruce Richmond (Game of Thrones), Callum Greene (Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker) and former Amazon head of genre Sharon Tal Yguado. Bryan Cogman (Game of Thrones), who served as a consulting producer on season one, has departed to focus on development. Former EP Gene Kelly has also departed the series.
A premiere date for
LOTR has not yet been determined. Pre-pandemic, Amazon Studios head Jennifer Salke
told The Hollywood Reporter that the “hope” was that
LOTR will be on the air in 2021. As part of the
LOTR deal, the show must be in production within two years of the original pact. It’s unclear if the production delays prompted by the pandemic will impact the show’s timeline. Sources tell
THR that the latest expectation is for
LOTR to launch in early 2022, though a late 2021 debut could be possible depending on production hurdles related to the pandemic.