Aleteia speaks to actor Daniel Weyman about Gandalf
Aleteia editor John Touhey interviews "Rings of Power" actor Daniel Weyman about playing Gandalf.
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00:00When you're drawing up this character who started off as the stranger, and now we know
00:10he has a name, which we'll get into in a moment.
00:13The very beginning of this journey, I was wondering, it must have been an incredible
00:17challenge for you, because you're really starting off with a blank slate, and I was wondering
00:22what was that like to really start with a character who was a blank slate and had to
00:26remain a blank slate for a period of time?
00:30Yeah, I mean, I think that was actually a huge gift for me as an actor, because I could
00:38just quiet the mind, I could just concentrate on, or rather focus on being present, being
00:45in the moment with the people I was working with, or just the landscape, if it was a scene.
00:50Just in season one, it was New Zealand, obviously, so, you know, there's a huge amount of nourishment
00:58and terror and wonder that that landscape can create.
01:03So I just had to make sure I was rooted in the space, I think, and actually, you know,
01:09the Stranger's Journey was mirroring mine to a certain extent.
01:11I had flown into this other world, literally the furthest I'd ever been in my life, around
01:16the other side of the earth from where I live, and, you know, COVID came along, so
01:22we were unable to get out, or friends, family to come in.
01:26So there were lots of things that were new and discombobulating and difficult and wonderful,
01:35and I really just had to be there and honestly, truthfully, sort of authentically try and
01:42respond in the moment, you know, as best I could.
01:47So it was a real gift, because I think it took the curse off.
01:50Lines can often, for me anyway, you know, they can become very cerebral.
01:56I want to do this with the line, or this is what the audience needs to know, or, you know,
02:01and actually not having lines, just responding, especially to Mark Ellett, who I worked with
02:06most of all, he played Nori, you know, watching and being inquisitive about it, being curious,
02:12just, you know, being curious is such a good touchstone for him, I think, at the beginning,
02:18you know, was actually a gift.
02:21And now we know you've been through this journey, you do have a name, now you know you're Gandalf,
02:28and I'm wondering, when did you first encounter the character of Gandalf in your life?
02:34And did you ever imagine yourself playing this character?
02:37Well, I mean, you know, I think when you think about, when I think back to being a kid, and
02:42those sorts of fantasies, those dreams, those, whether they're daydreams or real dreams,
02:47you know, the idea of becoming magic or being magic, I think was definitely present in me.
02:54I loved the idea of being sort of special in some way, having some kind of power, you know,
03:00and I've always been fascinated by magic, and, you know, a bit like the stranger wanting to know
03:08how you do it, how's it done, how do I do it, and what can I do to be better at it,
03:11all that kind of stuff. And so I think, you know, for a long part of my childhood, those kind of,
03:20whether it was superhero type things, or whether it was wizardy type things,
03:25they were always present in imaginative games, in imaginative stories, you know,
03:28whether I was reading literature, and certainly would have come across
03:32Gandalf and all the other characters in the Lord of the Rings from the books.
03:37And I think the joy of coming to, you know, as a middle-aged man is that part of the thing
03:44they wanted from me, certainly when we started filming and continuing all the way through,
03:48has been the idea of allowing the child wonder to come back through, allowing that to be present,
03:55allowing, yeah, there are other things, there are things about darkness and seduction of power,
04:00and knowing a path and trying to work all that stuff out, but at his base, there was this idea
04:06of literally looking at the landscape that he was in, at the people he was with, the beings he was
04:12with, and being curious about them. And I think a number of the cast had kids out in New Zealand
04:19with us when we started, and, you know, obviously now I know their families as well back in the UK,
04:24and watching kids and how they interact with things around them is always enlightening,
04:31I think, for an older person, because we can become a bit cynical about things,
04:35or we can have seen something so often that it doesn't register anymore, but, you know,
04:39when you see a kid focus on something that's exciting to it, they laser in, you know,
04:45they really do become focused, and you can't tell how long that focus is going to last. I remember
04:49being with, whether it's my own kids or other young people, and you see, you know, you think,
04:55oh, I'm going to join them in this piece of imaginary world or in this piece of focus,
04:59and suddenly they branch off onto something else, and you're sort of playing catch-up. So
05:04I love that idea with the stranger, you know, and becoming the wizard that, in fact, the thing that
05:12was driving him was this sort of childish wonder about the possibilities, about what he was seeing
05:18and smelling, all the senses. And I think that really harks back to my childhood, when those,
05:23you know, those dreams of, well, wouldn't it be amazing if I found tomorrow that I was actually
05:29magic, you know? And I think that's what things like Harry Potter tie into, isn't it? You know,
05:35the reason people can immerse themselves, like with Lords of the Rings, the reason we can immerse
05:39ourselves in these universes, these imaginary worlds, is because they're pretty universal
05:44themes, you know, we've all had those feelings at one stage or other, and I'm lucky enough to
05:49be paid to do it as a job. Well, that brings up something I was really curious about, which is,
05:55you know, actors really are kind of wizards in a certain sense. We see the magic as an audience
06:01member, but I'm curious from your point of view, when you're actually there filming a scene, and
06:06you're not seeing what we're seeing, you have the cameras and all, and especially in something
06:10Lord of the Rings, there must be a lot of technicians, like, what is it like from your
06:13point of view when you're actually filming, and how do you throw yourself into something when
06:19there's, when from your point of view, there's something totally different than what we're seeing?
06:23That's a really good question, and I think, you know, with the bringing of CGI more and more
06:29into film or television, there is a question mark about how much we as actors on the day
06:37get to understand what the filmmakers are going to assemble after the event, you know, what is
06:43this piece of magic going to look like, what are these animals that are sort of hybrids of wolves
06:49going to look like, you know, what is the wind effect going to be, how much sand will there be
06:54in the air, all those kind of questions you don't see before you film it, and so for me a lot of the
06:59a lot of the work is to use that imagination, use the, you know, forget about looking stupid,
07:07forget it, lose my self-consciousness, a lot of my self-awareness, keep a little bit of a
07:12monitor for safety, but generally try and lose all of that and get so involved in the imaginative
07:17world that I'm trying to create, or the group of us are trying to create, that although you, you know,
07:22if you were there watching us film, you wouldn't see the sand whizzing around, it's definitely there,
07:28it's definitely there in the sort of imaginative world inside my head, and I feel it sort of in my
07:32body, and I guess that is, you're right, that there's this kind of conjuring trick, isn't there, where the
07:38give you an example, I did a play a few years ago, and the character had to go through
07:42a nervous breakdown, and after four weeks of rehearsing, and four weeks of playing the character,
07:49we then moved it to the West End, and I began to develop a bit of a pain behind my,
07:53behind one of my eyes, I was a bit worried about this pain, because it felt, it didn't feel great,
07:58you know, and I went to the doctor, and I said, she said to me, what do you do, and I talked
08:03about the part, and especially the breakdown, and she said, look, you're telling your body,
08:08some way you're telling your body every night, that you're going through this really massive
08:12ordeal, and your body is responding, your body is getting prepared for the fight, or the flight, you
08:18know, it's doing that every night, and it's on, it's on, it's on, and it's no wonder that these little,
08:22these little physical things are beginning to happen, because your body doesn't necessarily
08:29know that it's not for real, you know, and that is testament, I think, to how we, and it's not just
08:34actors, like we all can do this, but it's great to be allowed to do it, and, you know, we can
08:39all conjure such, such strong imaginative worlds, again, and come back, come back to, like, the
08:44analogy for me of a theatre job, where you would, you might go and watch something in a black box
08:49space, so no, you know, no nods to furniture, or scenery, or setting, or anything, actors really just
08:55working in a very blank canvas, but how quickly an audience can believe that they see streets,
09:02that they see landscape, that they, they understand the relationships, that these people have been
09:06together for years and years, even though they've just met them, you know, 20 minutes ago, it's a
09:11real testament to human imagination, I think. Yeah, it really is magic. So, for the stranger to become
09:20Gandalf, very interesting, he had to go through a test, he says at the end, and what was this test
09:27for you, from your point of view? I think, yeah, I feel like it isn't just, it isn't just, it's sort
09:35of oversimplified to make it like, oh, there's a test, there's a hurdle he's got to get out, I think
09:39actually, he is on a sort of process of trying to, he said to Nóirà at the end of season one,
09:48that wizard means wise one, and I think, really, it's for us to try and justify, or quantify what wisdom
09:55is, and from my experience playing the stranger, and getting to my middle age, it seems abundantly
10:00clear that the more I learn about the world, the less I realise I actually knew about the world,
10:05it's like every door I'm opening is a new door, and I'm thinking, well, how have I got to 47 and
10:10not really understood this yet? Or how is it that I have never come across this, or thought about
10:13their point of view? And that feels like the journey that the stranger is going on. And so
10:18Tom Bombadil is another, it's just another sort of layer of that that's coming up, and this idea
10:24about destiny, versus friendship, it ties in, there's this sort of uber-destiny, this sort of
10:31massive, eternal thing, and this sort of microcosm of what we would call humanity and
10:39community within the sort of half of friendships he's generated, or been part of. You know,
10:45you've got this, you've got this weird, it seems like it's a one or the other, but of course,
10:50the stranger, in his desire to control, or his desire to understand, his desire to get it right,
10:57it so veers towards trying to make the overall, veers towards fixing the overall arc of the sort
11:06of universe, that it's easy to forget the minutiae. And actually, what he's learning
11:10is that if you go back to the things that are important, if you serve the friendship, the love,
11:16the honesty, the integrity, the forgiveness, the seeking forgiveness, all these things,
11:22if you serve those small, really core things that are foundational to his being, or many of our
11:27beings, then that way, the future will sort of take care of itself. And that, for me, has been
11:33his journey in season two. And I think what I loved about the Gandalf, as Gandalf becomes present in
11:40this last episode, is that he isn't bestowing it on himself. You know, he doesn't sort of slam a
11:47staff into the ground and say, I'm Gandalf, and now everybody will take notice of me. What happens
11:52is other people begin to need to call him something. They feel something for him, and they
11:56find words that allow them to express, you know, in what we call a name, how they feel about this
12:04character. And, you know, you see that with the stores leaving and calling him Grandalf, and
12:08there's a certain amount of, you can sort of feel that they think of him as a sort of benevolent
12:13creature, something that they can be themselves with, something that, you know, will be on
12:18their side going forward. And I love that the name came outwardly to him, as opposed to from
12:24inwardly outwards, if that makes sense. Well, thank you. I really enjoyed this conversation.
12:29I really enjoyed your performance, and I look forward to seeing where this journey
12:34takes you as an actor and the character. So thank you very much.
12:38Lovely to talk to you. Cheers.