3,000 Hobbit hopefuls cause film set shutdown

Organisers of open auditions for Peter Jackson’s highly-anticipated follow-up to the Lord of the Rings were forced to shut down operations due to safety concerns when more than 3,000 arrived - 1,800 more than anticipated.

The auditions, which were set to take place in Lower Hutt near Wellington in New Zealand, shut down after just 800 people were seen because the number of people had become too overwhelming.

It was reported by NZ Newswire that the production company 3foot7 decided to shut down proceedings when it became obvious that parking and queuing near the event was spilling over onto a nearby highway.

Senior sergeant Steve Braybrook told NZ Newswire: "There was enough concern that the police attend."

"There's a lot of parking there and there's actually quite a lot of room, but as the day went on basically the line got so long," organiser Chris Ryan told the New Zealand Herald.

"It was just starting to cause a few problems on the motorway, people slowing down and looking at the crowds, really, I think more than anything else."

The audition was a chance for New Zealand’s vertically challenged community to overcome short jokes and show their faces in a major motion picture, as the casting call asked for men under 164cm and women under 155com, as well as big men and women with “character faces”, women with long hair and men with large biceps. The search will now be conducted online.

The Hobbit, based on the 1937 novel by J.R.R. Tolkien, is the prequel to The Lord of the Rings trilogy and Jackson will serve as director, producer and co-writer. The film will see several actors from the hugely successful Lord of the Rings films reprise their roles including: Ian McKellen, Andy Serkis, Hugo Weaving, Cate Blanchett, Christopher Lee, Ian Holm, Elijah Wood and Orlando Bloom.

Elijah Wood, who starred as Frodo in The Lord of the Rings told E!, “The opportunity to go back to New Zealand to play that character again…it felt like a family reunion. It felt like stepping back into time," Wood said. "I turned 19 in Hobbiton and I'm 30 now."