Jono, Ben & Megan - The Podcast - BONUS: Leon Wadham On The New Lord Of The Rings TV Series.

Episode Date: October 10, 2022

Whilst Jono and Ben are on holiday, we throw it back to the time we caught up with Leon Wadham, the Kiwi actor who stars on the latest Lord Of The Rings TV show!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Hits with a bonus podcast from Jono and Ben. Lord of the Rings was such an iconic and huge movie series filmed in New Zealand and now there's a brand new series, Lord of the Rings, Rings of Power, which is on right now. And we've got one of the actors, a Kiwi actor, who's starring in the show, Leon Wadham. Leon, well, great to have you here. Congratulations on the success.

Thank you very much. That's so awesome. Cheers. Yeah. I mean, you went from, like, to pull back the curtain, you went, you did some work with us a few years ago on our TV show, Jono and Ben. I mean, you took the right path in life. I mean, look at us.

And look where you are, on the biggest, most expensive show ever made. Nobody saw this coming. This was a shock to all. On the cheapest radio show ever made. This is a cheap radio show? I can't tell. This to me seems fancy. Like, because they say it was the most expensive series ever made. I mean, cheap radio show. I can't tell. This to me seems fancy. They say it was the most expensive series ever made. I mean, I imagine most of that's

your fee, but are you taking that aside? Not cheap. Well, do you notice it when you're on set? You're like, wow, they've gone to the effort of building this or the crew. You notice it on your way to set? Because there are just so many people working on it. The sets, the costumes, all the stuff that goes into it, it's extraordinary. The scale,

the detail. But then when you get into a scene, it's extraordinary, the scale, the detail. But then when you get into a scene, it's just you talking to another actor. It feels like any other TV show. Except with 400 people outside eating catering. Yeah, yeah. It's when you walk outside of the little ring of the camera and go like, oh, this is a big operation. Yeah.

Does it need, could you scale back on a couple of things, do you think? If Leon was running this production, could we have saved a bit on, you know, sausage rolls or... I need the sausage rolls. I think other people do too. I wouldn't dare cut those away. Now, you've been around the world recently

with all the big premieres, Comic-Con as well, 6,500 people there. I mean, that must be wild to think, you know, there's so many fans for Lord of the Rings around the world. Yeah, it's pretty bizarre. I was told you couldn't prepare for the sound of six and a half thousand people, and the weird thing is that you can feel it. They're so loud that they

vibrate the sound of them through the floor. But it was such a nice crowd, and it's been such a nice time. I think because there are so many of us in the cast, you don't really feel the pressure. Right. You can kind of share the load. But you were saying you're not on until episode four. I turned up in episode four, so they would show the first two episodes

whenever we had a premiere and I'd sort of wear nice clothes and then not have to face myself, which felt really, really good. Well, speaking of saving on costs, maybe we didn't have to pay for the guy who's not into it so far to fly around the world.

And so I imagine, you know, celebrities, famous people, Jeff Bezos is there. I mean, it's all just, they're all there. It was bonkers. I kind of just turned my brain off and enjoyed the experience, but I can't remember any of it.

You just look adorable in the show poster too. So what is your role on the show? I play Kemen. He's the son of a politician, Farazon, over in Numenor. He's had a really easy time of it. They call him like the Donald Trump Jr. of Middle Earth. Is that something you're like, oh, hang on, who's saying that? I did not say that myself.

Somebody else said that in response to things I said, though, so fair enough. He's just been born into immense privilege, swimming and drinking wine and wearing silk and eating seafood. He doesn't understand what's out there, but things are about to change. Is he the sort of character who would get a grape fed to him? Oh, yeah. Appealed grape. Appealed grape, yeah.

How do you end up on a show like this? Obviously, you auditioned. Yes, I auditioned. I did a tape for this character the week New Zealand went into lockdown. So I was in my bedroom with my flatmate. I had my iPhone balanced on a chopping board, balanced on a ladder. It was held upright by the retractable bit of a tape measure. It was a very lo-fi audition.

And I thought, well, I mean, the world is ending. So it doesn't matter. Might as well give this a bash. We'll see what happens. And then six months later, they said, could you come in tomorrow and send two new scenes? And I went, what? And tried to learn them as best I could.

And then two weeks later, I had the job. Wow. Wow. Yeah. Again, it was out of nowhere. It's such a surreal left turn in my life. Hey, now we've got Liam Wharton with us in new series, Lord of the Rings, the prequel to Lord of the Rings out now on Amazon.

Now, I wanted to see, you know, because obviously you've done comedy as well, being an actor as well. I wanted to see if you could guess the Lord of the Rings punchline from some internet jokes out there. We'll see how we go. We can work through these ones.

Okay, so why did Frodo the Hobbit put his phone on silent? He was tired of... The ring? The ring! Oh, Jono's got this one. All right, okay. I didn't know I was meant to be playing this game.

That's actually really good. Okay, okay. See, Jono, you can play too. Well, I don't know. That's all I know about Lord of the Rings. That's perfect. Okay, Leon. You must have, Jono, you can play too. Well, I don't know. That's all I know about Lord of the Rings. That's perfect. Okay, Leon. You might have better instinct.

I'm thinking about the Silmarillion and going, like, it's going to be some obscure reference to. Yeah, well, these, yeah, okay, okay. Okay, what do you call a hobbit eating at KFC? Lord of the... Fries? Wings? Oh, wait, Jono.

I'm bad at it. I'm thinking of real things that exist. Okay, okay. The Lord of the Rings pinball machine. Pinball. It's amazing. It doesn't accept coins, though. Only rings?

I keep saying rings, mate. Rings has worked out so far for him, to be fair. He's got two from two. Two from two is pretty good. He's saying rings unconfidently. It doesn't accept coins. Only think of the author of the books. Or tokens.

Tokens. Only tokens. Yeah, there you go. Yeah, there you go. Doesn't accept coins. Only think of the author of the books. Oh, tokens. Tokens. Yeah, there you go. Yeah, there you go. That's so bad. That's the worst one, I reckon. And finally, the final internet punchline to guess from the Lord of the Rings jokes. I love how he keeps blaming the internet, too.

He's like, this is not on me. This is on the internet. Someone's worked hard on these jokes. Okay, I was once obsessed with Lord of the Rings. The books, movies, collectibles, everything. Finally, I was able to kick the hobbits. Well done. I finished strong.

You did finish strong. Leon, hey, well done, man. This is just, what an amazing journey you're going on. Yeah. I am enjoying every minute.