Andy Serkis has defended the near-uniformly white cast assembled for his upcoming Lord of the Rings prequel, “The Hunt for Gollum,” after mounting criticism online over the absence of any confirmed actors of color. Speaking to BBC News ahead of the film’s December 2027 release, the actor-director said Tolkien’s source material shaped his casting choices and rejected the idea of filling roles simply to meet diversity expectations.
“Tolkien himself was influenced a lot by Norse mythology, there’s a lot of that feeling,” Serkis told the BBC. “The Shire feels very, very much like a very, a very white, you know…” He added that the Hobbits at the center of the story “are not very concerned about what goes on beyond the borders of The Shire, but they know they don’t want people coming in.”
Every major casting announcement for the project has featured white performers, including Jamie Dornan, Anya Taylor-Joy, Kate Winslet and Leo Woodall. Elijah Wood and Ian McKellen return as Frodo Baggins and Gandalf. Serkis, who reprises his role as Gollum and directs the film, acknowledged the backlash directly. “Yes, there have been criticisms,” he said, adding that his production would not pursue “a politically correct just-casting-for-the-sake-of-casting-and-ticking-boxes version of the film.”
The comments stand in contrast to Amazon’s “The Rings of Power,” which drew its own early backlash for casting choices before settling into a markedly more diverse ensemble. Cast member Lenny Henry told The Times in 2022 that contemporary audiences want to see themselves reflected on screen, arguing that Tolkien’s texts leave room for interpretation given descriptions of certain peoples as darker-skinned.
Serkis has spent years positioning himself as an advocate for on-set equality, pointing to his experience as one of few white cast members on “Black Panther” as formative. He also used the interview to close the door on directing “Shadow of the Past,” a separate Middle-earth spinoff co-written by Stephen Colbert, saying simply, “that post has been taken.” Additional casting for “The Hunt for Gollum” is expected in the coming months, leaving open the possibility the ensemble could still shift before filming wraps in New Zealand.
