The Rings of Power on Prime Video: How did the actors learn Elvish?

The Rings of Power on Prime Video: How did the actors learn Elvish?

Cartography, history, bestiary, mythology… When he created his world, so rich and complex, JRR Tolkien left nothing to chance, going so far as to forge several languages ​​from A to Z for his characters.

Among these various dialects spoken in Middle-earth, the most famous is undoubtedly the dialects of the Elves, which can be heard many times in the first episodes of The Rings of Power series, available on Prime Video from September 2nd.

But how did the translators of Elrond, Arondir, Celebrimbor and other elven heroes prepare to ensure the best pronunciation? At the recent San Diego Comic Con, we were able to ask them a question.

“Fortunately, we had ‘specialists’ in different languages ​​to create the illusion that we could speak fluently”Says Charles Edwards, interpreter of the Elf Celebrimbor, Honored Blacksmith. “Given the complexity of some languages, it will take years.”

As we see during the sequence of the first episode of the series, Robert Aramaio, who gives his features to Elrond, wrote more in the language of the elves than spoke:

“I tried to learn how to write Elvis rather than how to speak”he explains. “We’ve had an impressive number of lessons. Fortunately, I love to draw and it’s almost like drawing to write this language.”

Ismael Cruz Cordova of Puerto Rican originwho portrays the elf Arondir, relied on his native language to learn to master the basics of elf:

“It seems to have similarities to Spanish, so it helped me learn some basics for my character. I learned to read it better than to speak it, that’s for sure. I think I did well in the end, and the illusion is there.”

Emma Horvath, the translator of the Eärien, was not supposed to learn Elvish, but Numenorean: a completely different dialect used in the Isle of Man kingdom:

“I spent a lot of time with Daniel Reeve, who created some of the maps you see in the film, and he’s the one who created the alphabet for the language of the island of Numenor. So I learned the language as best as I could, and it was quite a challenge. I’m quite proud to say that I can read this mythical language .”

Interview in San Diego in July 2022

(re)discover the series trailer…

Source: allocine

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