The Making of…

Chapter 31

Welcome to Middle Earth!

I rolled out of bed with a groan, slamming my alarm and tousling my hair – and wincing as I found a clip that I’d forgotten to take out last night. I sat up and yawned, looking around my messy hotel room in L.A. We’d flown here after the London premiere, and last night had been our second one. Checking the time, I saw that I had a few more hours before we all had to be at the airport to fly back to New Zealand for the final premiere. After showering and changing, I set about tidying up and packing, stuffing my clothes into my small case and digging around under my bed for my shoes. Just as I was pulling them on, my phone rang.

“Hello?” I answered, not bothering to check the number.

“Hey Ki, its Elijah!” His cheery voice called down the phone.

“Morning Lij.” I smiled, stamping on my suitcase as I tried to pull to zip up. “What’s up?”

“Uh, well you know how we were all supposed to head to the airport together? Well there seems to have been a mix-up with the cars, they’re all arriving at different times.” He mumbled anxiously.

“Oh… So, what do I have to do?” I asked, frowning a little.

“Not much, your car isn’t going to be here for a while; I think you’re sharing with Liv.” He replied as I violently kicked my suitcase in an attempt to compact its contents.

“How long ‘til its here?”

“About half an hour.”

“That’s fine.” I smiled, “I’ll have time to grab some breakfast.”

“Great, see you at the airport!” He sang, obviously happy that I wasn’t grumpy about the mix-up.

“Bye.” I smiled, hanging up and slipping my phone into the pocket of my jeans as I eyed up my suitcase. Why is repacking so hard?

A few minutes later, I was sitting in the reception of the hotel with Liv, eating a muffin that I’d nicked from the breakfast buffet.

“The paparazzi are out.” She commented as we stared out the window, waiting for our car. Everyone else had left and were probably at the airport by now.

“When aren’t they out?” I smiled, tossing my muffin-wrapper into a nearby bin. Last night we’d been bombarded with the same questions as before. ‘Are you and Viggo dating?’ ‘Do you kiss in this movie or the next ones?’ and the likes of that. It was getting a little old, as we kept giving the same replies. Has the word ‘No’ lost all meaning?

“Here’s the car.” Liv smiled, standing and grabbing her bags as I did the same. We got to the door and tried to make a break for the car before we were noticed by the group of about ten photographers, but they seemed to have some sort of sixth sense – either that, or noses like bloodhounds (or as Gimli might say, ‘The eyes of a hawk and the ears of a fox’!). “Leg it!” Liv yelped as they pursued us to the car, yelling questions and cameras flashing – was that a T.V camera I could see? I couldn’t help but laugh when Liv couldn’t get the door open because it was locked.

“Liv! Kira! Wait!” Someone called behind us as she scrambled into the car. It was still weird when I heard people call my name, I wasn’t used to this much attention.

“Kira! Do you have any statements about the nature of your relationship with Viggo Mortensen?” A reporter yelled. I sighed in exasperation and checked my watch- fifteen minutes before we had to meet the guys, and it was less than ten minutes to the airport. I put one foot on the seat of the car, and hoisted myself up until I was sitting on the roof, above all the photographers.

“Right, you have five minutes, what do you want to know?” I smiled as cheerfully as I could as the reporter repeated the Viggo question. “As I’ve said before, we’re just friends. That’s all there is to know. My relationship with Viggo is no different to my relationships with any other cast member.” To be truthful, Viggo was my closest friend on set, but so what if it was a little white-lie?

“How do you feel the film’s been received?” Someone else shouted, thrusting a microphone into my face.

“I’ve heard some pretty good reviews so far, so I think it’s gone down well.” I replied as more and more people tried to shout over each other.

“Can we expect any plot twists in the next two movies?”

“Sorry, I’m not at liberty to disclose that information.” I smiled, using the line Peter had told us to say when we were asked about the next two films. I answered a few more questions before checking my watch. “I’ve got to go now; it’s been nice talking with you.” I waved, hopping down from the roof and slipping into the car.

“What was that?” Liv asked as I shut the door.

“I was just answering a few questions.” I shrugged as the car pulled off. “I figure if I answer them all at once, they won’t have an excuse to bother me in the future.”

“You’ve probably created a bit of a stir.” She muttered as I stared out the window.

“Me?” I laughed, “I’m pretty sure the media has better stuff to do than worry about me.”

“Whatever, just don’t blame me if you get jumped by reporters the next time they see you.” She sighed. Was she mad at me? I couldn’t tell. Maybe she was just in a bad mood…

The car pulled up outside the airport and we managed to make a dash for the door, and quickly found the others in the departure lounge. They were all staring at one of the large plasma-screen TV’s that hung from the roof.

“Hey guys, what are you watching… Oh.” I smiled as we approached them, and then raised an eyebrow as I spotted myself on the screen. “Well that got around fast.”

“They were probably broadcasting live.” Liv muttered behind me as I heard myself answer the questions as comments rolled across the screen.

“Where on earth do you find the patience to do that, Ki?” Elijah asked as I explained my theory about them bothering me less.

“Was it stupid of me?” I cringed as my interview was repeated and everyone lost interest in the screen.

“Rather professional actually.” Ian commented, sitting down on one of the nearby benches.

“I didn’t really consider what I was doing.” I shrugged, “I was just getting a little fed up with being asked about dating Vig.”

“Trust me, they don’t know the meaning of the word ‘No’.” Sean smiled as I sighed with relief, glad that no one was mad at me for my unofficial press conference.

We boarded the plane, and I found myself sitting beside Viggo again. He was pretty much silent as we took off, and stared out the window for the first few minutes. Something was definitely up.

“Viggo?” I asked quietly as he stared blankly out the small window. “Vig are you angry at me?”

“What? No!” He answered quickly, startling me as he turned back to me. He must have seen my concerned expression as he smiled gently. “No, why would I be angry at you?”

“I don’t know… You’ve just been really quiet and I thought you might be mad because of what I told the reporters…” I trailed off as he took my hand in his and squeezed it gently, prompting my cheeks to flush red.

“Ki I would never be angry at you for something like that.” He smiled, “I was just caught up in my own thoughts is all.” I smiled with relief as he tousled my hair, “You’re such a worrier.” He teased as I ducked my head in embarrassment.

“Sorry…” I mumbled.

“And stop apologising, you’ve done nothing wrong.” He squeezed my hand again and I rested my head on his shoulder.

“Thanks Vig.” I sighed as he released my hand and wrapped his arm around my shoulders.

“No problem.” He smiled, mindlessly playing with a strand of my hair and causing me to blush again. It was almost too easy to be this close to him… If I wasn’t careful, I might end up doing something stupid…

*

The day of the Wellington premiere rolled around, and we decided to be a lot more casual for this one, seeing as it was being held in the middle of the day, in blaring summer sunshine. I dressed in a short, pale pink summer dress, not too formal, or too casual. Wellington had really gone all-out with the celebrations. The red carpet was lined with men dressed as Gondorian soldiers, and children dressed as Hobbits, and on top of the cinema, was a gigantic model cave-troll! But probably best of all, for one day, the name of the city had been officially changed from Wellington, to Middle Earth!

“Wow!” I laughed as we walked down the carpet, signing autographs and answering questions. Billy and Dom were running around with video cameras, filming everything and Viggo was being his usual photographing-self, snapping pictures of me with the Hobbit kids and the soldiers. And I was pretty sure that someone had spiked Orlando’s drink earlier, as he was insanely hyper! He was running everywhere, attacking people in the middle of interviews with hugs and acting like a total child!

“What’s gotten you so hyper?” I asked as he tackled me for about the fifth time.

“This is our last premiere for the Fellowship of the Ring!” He cried, grabbing my hand and twirling me around as if we were dancing. I laughed as he released me and went off to find Liv. I felt someone catch me around the waist and looked up to see Viggo holding his camera in front of us.

“I haven’t had any photos with you yet.” He grinned, snapping a picture as I smiled and a few confetti-cannons went off behind us. He gave me a quick hug before releasing me and we walked into the cinema to watch the movie again.

*

With all the premieres finished, we were given another few days off from filming so we could do a few things for the DVD extras, like commentaries and interviews. For the interviews, we were shown into a small room one-by-one, where there was a camera set up, and someone would be asking us a few questions. When it was my turn to go in, I was shown into the room and sat down on a comfy leather chair – being told that my interviewer would be here in a moment. I looked around and chatted to the cameraman for a while, until the door opened and a girl with long, dark hair walked in. She looked around the same age as me and smiled cheerfully as she sat down opposite me.

“Hey,” She smiled, holding out her hand for me to shake, “I’m Raven.”

“Hi.” I smiled in return, shaking her hand and sitting back in the chair.

“I’m just going to ask you a few things about filming and stuff like that, and you can basically answer however you like.” She said as she leafed through a few sheets of paper with questions haphazardly scribbled on them. “I guess we should begin with your co-stars, let’s start with Elijah.”

As I answered her questions, it began to feel less like an interview and more like a casual conversation between two friends. “And what about Viggo?” She asked and I tensed a little, before remembering that she wasn’t a reporter and wasn’t going to start asking me about the rumours, I could be as honest as I wanted.

“Viggo? Well I suppose he’s the person I’ve grown closest to on set… I guess I sort of clung to him from the very beginning, because I’d arrived late and hadn’t a clue what was going on, so I sort of just followed him around, because he seemed to know what he was doing!” We laughed a little before I continued, “I guess because we do pretty much all our scenes together it was easy to get to know him, he’s just always been there for me – everyone on set has, but Viggo in particular has always been by my side, through the good and the bad.” I smiled fondly, remembering all the times he’d been there, supporting me. “He’s just a great guy.” Raven smiled and started to ask me about filming, and I basically told her everything, from our crazy makeup bus to our adventures in the elvish boats – every mad experience we’d had so far. She listened intently to every minute of it and laughed when I told her about things like Dom’s game of truth or dare, and us stopping to have lunch in the middle of Sean’s death scene. I was sorry when the interview ended; it was nice to have a girl to talk to who wasn’t directly involved in the movie. Just before I left the interview room I stopped and turned back to her.

“Hey, um, Raven?” I asked as she collected her notes.

“Yeah?”

“The guys and I were going to go out for some drinks tonight, do you want to come?”

“Sure!” She smiled, and we quickly exchanged phone numbers. “Are you sure the guys won’t mind me being there? I mean, I’m not a member of the cast or anything…” She trailed off uncertainly as I smiled.

“Of course not,” I assured her, “Most of them run off to chat up girls anyway, so I need someone to talk to!” She smiled and nodded.

“Ok… So, see you tonight then?”

“Yep, see you later!” I waved as I left and jogged back to my trailer to get ready for the night ahead.