Session 4-19: Creative Content - Casting for Season 4

Galathil would be just as neglectful. The gender of the parent/grandparent isn’t really important, is it?
 
If Galathil remains in Ossiriand when Nimloth goes to Doriath with Dior, the fact that Morgoth’s forces control much of Beleriand would explain her apparent neglect of her descendants at the Mouths if Sirion. She wouldn’t be able to travel to them, or she wouldn’t want to abandon the rest of the Green-elves.

Alternatively, we could say that she had already gone east over the mountains like Galadriel and Celeborn by that time.
 
Galathil would be just as neglectful. The gender of the parent/grandparent isn’t really important, is it?
I had a concept of Galathil (when he was male) getting killed while defending the refugees fleeing the Second Kinslaying, it’s a bit of a pattern of one person staying behind to defend a retreat, like Hurin at the Nirnaeth Arnoediad, Glorfindel vs the Balrog in the Fall of Gondolin, and Gandalf vs Durin’s Bane in The Fellowship of the Ring.
 
I had a concept of Galathil (when he was male) getting killed while defending the refugees fleeing the Second Kinslaying, it’s a bit of a pattern of one person staying behind to defend a retreat, like Hurin at the Nirnaeth Arnoediad, Glorfindel vs the Balrog in the Fall of Gondolin, and Gandalf vs Durin’s Bane in The Fellowship of the Ring.
Yes that’s a recurring and great motif. We will have chances to use it, I’m not sure if Galathil is a person who should be given that significance, though.
 
I have some problems with the concept of a small Idril. We’ve cast taller actors/actresses for both her parents (Turgon’s actor is 6’5” and Gabrielle Wilde is 5’10”), so the odds are on her being relatively tall and being short will make her look like she’s not their daughter. A smaller Idril will undoubtedly struggle in kissing scenes with Tuor (I witnessed this sort of thing with Sally Hawkins, who was 5’2”, and Rupert Penry-Jones (6’2”) in Persuasion). Furthermore, Elves on principle are tall, so Idril will not look like an Elf.

It's really not an unusual situation for actors of mis-matched heights to have to do kissing scenes. Typically, a kissing scene is a close-up, so they can do whatever shenanigans necessary to erase the height difference in that scene. A typical solution is to make the shorter one stand on a box and the taller one stand with legs in a split to bring their faces to the right height.

In Thor: The Dark World, they had Natalie Portman run up a ramp to greet Chris Hemsworth for their reunion slap-in-the-face.
If real life, she is *significantly* shorter than him (she's 5'3", and he's 6'3"), but in this scene, she's only a little bit shorter.

In Supernatural, they had Sam (Jared Padelecki) sit or be in bed for most of the kissing scenes with Ruby (Genevieve Cortese), who is at least a foot shorter than him. These actors eventually got married, so I'd say they managed to work out the height difference in real life, too....
She wears heels:
jared-padalecki-wife-2.jpg

Or he bends down:
77005ad4b9bcd80d6fc1be586dad702e.jpg




Realistically, a 5'8" woman is going to appear 'short' when standing next to her 6'5" father. So, I'm really not worried about her having to be too short. We have cast very short women as elves before (Earwen is sorter than me, if I recall correctly). Certainly, you can nominate someone taller for Idril if you'd like, and we'll see how the chips fall. I think one can find someone who would be described as 'petite' or 'diminutive' without necessarily being super short. Also, she's going to be running around barefoot, so that will make her look shorter than she is.



As for Galathil, their thoughts were that there was no need to cast a character they hadn't determined a role for yet. As of right now, the Execs were in agreement that we don't need him.
 
It's really not an unusual situation for actors of mis-matched heights to have to do kissing scenes. Typically, a kissing scene is a close-up, so they can do whatever shenanigans necessary to erase the height difference in that scene. A typical solution is to make the shorter one stand on a box and the taller one stand with legs in a split to bring their faces to the right height.

In Thor: The Dark World, they had Natalie Portman run up a ramp to greet Chris Hemsworth for their reunion slap-in-the-face.
If real life, she is *significantly* shorter than him (she's 5'3", and he's 6'3"), but in this scene, she's only a little bit shorter.

In Supernatural, they had Sam (Jared Padelecki) sit or be in bed for most of the kissing scenes with Ruby (Genevieve Cortese), who is at least a foot shorter than him. These actors eventually got married, so I'd say they managed to work out the height difference in real life, too....
She wears heels:
jared-padalecki-wife-2.jpg

Or he bends down:
77005ad4b9bcd80d6fc1be586dad702e.jpg




Realistically, a 5'8" woman is going to appear 'short' when standing next to her 6'5" father. So, I'm really not worried about her having to be too short. We have cast very short women as elves before (Earwen is sorter than me, if I recall correctly). Certainly, you can nominate someone taller for Idril if you'd like, and we'll see how the chips fall. I think one can find someone who would be described as 'petite' or 'diminutive' without necessarily being super short. Also, she's going to be running around barefoot, so that will make her look shorter than she is.



As for Galathil, their thoughts were that there was no need to cast a character they hadn't determined a role for yet. As of right now, the Execs were in agreement that we don't need him.


I actually was wondering, Marie, how you felt about Padelecki as Rog or Echthelion. :) And I thought he was taller than 6'3". He always seems to tower over everyone else on that show.
 
Jared Padalecki is 6'4" (1.94 m). Jensen Ackles is 6'2". Chris Hemsworth is the one who is 6'3".

I'd be fine with him as an elf, especially an elf who does fight scenes. He's got amazingly long arms and legs. He's on the older end of the elf age spectrum (born 1982), but still under 40, and currently rather lean. He can't be taller than Turgon, so we're cutting it a little close, but I'd be willing to consider him, yeah.
 
It's really not an unusual situation for actors of mis-matched heights to have to do kissing scenes. Typically, a kissing scene is a close-up, so they can do whatever shenanigans necessary to erase the height difference in that scene. A typical solution is to make the shorter one stand on a box and the taller one stand with legs in a split to bring their faces to the right height.

In Thor: The Dark World, they had Natalie Portman run up a ramp to greet Chris Hemsworth for their reunion slap-in-the-face.
If real life, she is *significantly* shorter than him (she's 5'3", and he's 6'3"), but in this scene, she's only a little bit shorter.

In Supernatural, they had Sam (Jared Padelecki) sit or be in bed for most of the kissing scenes with Ruby (Genevieve Cortese), who is at least a foot shorter than him. These actors eventually got married, so I'd say they managed to work out the height difference in real life, too....
She wears heels:
jared-padalecki-wife-2.jpg

Or he bends down:
77005ad4b9bcd80d6fc1be586dad702e.jpg




Realistically, a 5'8" woman is going to appear 'short' when standing next to her 6'5" father. So, I'm really not worried about her having to be too short. We have cast very short women as elves before (Earwen is sorter than me, if I recall correctly). Certainly, you can nominate someone taller for Idril if you'd like, and we'll see how the chips fall. I think one can find someone who would be described as 'petite' or 'diminutive' without necessarily being super short. Also, she's going to be running around barefoot, so that will make her look shorter than she is.



As for Galathil, their thoughts were that there was no need to cast a character they hadn't determined a role for yet. As of right now, the Execs were in agreement that we don't need him.
Well, the candidates we’ve speculated in the past have been in the range from 5’6” to 5’9”. The Hosts explicitly said short for Idril, and I can’t get behind that because it’ll look like she’s a) not Turgon’s daughter and b) not an Elf. Anyways, the Hosts have said they want actresses on the taller end for Elven women, so I think it’s a bit odd that we’d be told that.

The candidates I personally support are Lily James (5’7”) and Sophie Turner (5’9”). Would that be too tall for them.
 
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Well, the candidates we’ve speculated in the past have been in the range from 5’6” to 5’9”. The Hosts explicitly said short for Idril, and I can’t get behind that because it’ll look like she’s a) not Turgon’s daughter and b) not an Elf. Anyways, the Hosts have said they want actresses on the taller end for Elven women, so I think it’s a bit odd that we’d be told that.

The candidates I personally support are Lily James (5’7”) and Sophie Turner (5’9”). Would that be too tall for them.

I'm not sure the argument that tall men have tall daughters holds up too well. I can understand the objection based on elves being tall a bit better, but I'm not convinced that the audience would feel at all confused about this.
 
Lily James is certainly significantly shorter than Pål Sverre Hagen, who is 6’5. If that difference is too small, we can always put him on a box.
 
I'm not sure the argument that tall men have tall daughters holds up too well. I can understand the objection based on elves being tall a bit better, but I'm not convinced that the audience would feel at all confused about this.
Right. I just think that Idril should be on the taller side (5’6” or taller), particularly since the Hosts said that they wanted taller actresses for Elven women for the last couple seasons.

Also, I’ve started a thread on Meril. Don’t know who would fit yet.
 
Question on Celeborn's sister: If we're having her go east amongst the Green Elves, how will we justify abandoning her kin like Elwing and later Elrond and Elros?
 
Question on Celeborn's sister: If we're having her go east amongst the Green Elves, how will we justify abandoning her kin like Elwing and later Elrond and Elros?

It probably isn't abandonment so much as a combination of not knowing for sure they are alive and not being able to cross the hordes of orcs between them.
 
It probably isn't abandonment so much as a combination of not knowing for sure they are alive and not being able to cross the hordes of orcs between them.
I could live with that. Not to mention the fact that Beleriand does get submerged in the last 50 years of the First Age. I guess we're not going to have scenes with them knowing that they're alive, right?
 
I actually was wondering, Marie, how you felt about Padelecki as Rog or Echthelion. :) And I thought he was taller than 6'3". He always seems to tower over everyone else on that show.

Jared Padalecki is 6'4" (1.94 m). Jensen Ackles is 6'2". Chris Hemsworth is the one who is 6'3".

My mistake; Ackles is 6'1". So, three inches shorter than his co-star Jared Padalecki. And, according to them, he still had to stand on a box for some scenes with Jared in Season 1. That is noticeable, because I remember thinking that maybe Jared didn't grow into his full height until later, based on some Season 1 shots (he was 22 then).

Also, while Jared Padalecki's imdb page says he's 6'4", at conventions he has on more than one occasion said he doesn't know how tall he is, but it's either 6'4" or 6'5". So who knows, if he doesn't even know himself? Also, I would have guessed that he's got very, very long legs (he can kick a guy in the face lying flat on his back), but Jensen Ackles says they wear the same size pants, and the height difference is all in their torsos (though Jensen is bow-legged). So, again, who knows?

At the 1:20 minute mark in this video, Jensen Ackles explains how sets deal with mis-matched heights of actors. Ruth Connell (Rowena) is 5'2", so a good 14" shorter than Jared Padalecki. Obviously, getting both of their heads in frame for a shot is a challenge!


And a scene with Jared Padalecki and Ruth Connell:
Alexander Calvert (Jack) is 5'9", so 7" taller than Ruth and 7" shorter than Jared. For the conversation at the end of this scene (2:06), they had to include all of them in the various shots.
 
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Question on Celeborn's sister: If we're having her go east amongst the Green Elves, how will we justify abandoning her kin like Elwing and later Elrond and Elros?

Unjustified, the same way she and Celeborn "abandoned" each other on the way West.

She departs for her own reasons, leaving behind adult relatives who are adults with adult brains and responsibilities.
 
Listening again to the session and I'm not really onboard with the Hosts' request that Thorondor is voiced by Daniel Day-Lewis, who is also playing Manwe. To me, it raises some questions about the nature of Thorondor, that Manwe is present, and doesn't help much with the affairs of the Noldor, ie that he either can't face Morgoth or he can and is for some reason kinda sitting on his heels and not putting out. It also discourages people from nominating other actors to voice Thorondor. Is that what the Hosts and others want?
 
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