Andy Serkis Says New Gollum Film Is ‘Acknowledging’ Lack of Diversity

My wife and I are big Rings of Power fans. And by that I mean we love The Lord of the Rings, enjoy that show, and forget about it during the multi-year hiatuses between seasons. It ain’t perfect, like Peter Jackson’s films, but it plays in a world I love, and when it sings, many of the shortcomings (often brought on by member-berry-induced nonsense) are easy to overlook. There’s a lot to love there, including its penchant for diverse casting.

Arondir is an elf character on the show, played by Ismael Cruz Córdova, a Puerto Rican actor. Not only is Córdova quite good in the role, but the character rules. He’s a badass elf who gets to do badass elf stuff. There are, of course, a bunch of C.H.U.D.S. who complained about the actor being cast, because the elves in Tolkien’s works have been portrayed as white, but, dammit, he’s an elf! They aren’t real! He can be whatever you want!

And that’s always what it comes down to. It’s not about checking some box, as someone might annoyingly say. If you cast a wide net, you often get diversity. It’s as simple as that. Rings of Power does that, and it’s actually made the conversation spill into other Tolkien projects. To my knowledge, no one asked Peter Jackson why his casts were so white. But dammit, people are asking Andy Serkis.

When asked about his casting for The Hunt For Gollum (a movie that people very much want, wink wink, nudge nudge), the actor/director passed the buck. “Tolkien himself was influenced a lot by Norse mythology; there’s a lot of that feeling. The Shire feels very, very much like a very, a very white, you know…,” he explained. “They’re not very concerned about what goes on beyond the borders of The Shire, but they know they don’t want people coming in.” That’s a pretty apt way to describe the Shire; I’ll give him that.

He went on to note that there have been criticisms for the lack of diversity, according to THR, but then he gives the same lazy answer plenty of folks have given before him. “This particular film is somewhat acknowledging that,” he notes. “But we don’t think we will be doing a politically correct just-casting-for-the sake-of-casting-and-ticking-boxes version of the film. So, it’s only where relevant basically.” Very interested to find out what he means by the film acknowledging the lack of diversity, because it really sounds like he’s just kicking the can down the road and hoping no one brings it up again.

Also, for the love of Zod, the “diversity for diversity’s sake” nonsense always pisses me off. It’s not “casting for the sake of casting,” Andy, it’s casting a wide net. It’s exploring every avenue. That’s how you get the best people. It’s only “blank for the sake of blank” when you think it’s being forced upon you, and that raises all kinds of other questions. Elves are fake. People are real. Any kind of person can play an elf. If you had cast a person of color, it doesn’t have to be because of some mandate.