Cate Blanchett Reveals 'No One Got Paid' For Doing Lord Of The Rings; 'Basically Got Free...'

Cate Blanchett, says they didn't earn a handsome salary for their roles in Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings.

By Marita Pinto

Published on Aug 09, 2024 | 08:42 AM IST | 53K

Image Courtesy: YouTube

Cate Blanchett debunked the claims that Peter Jackson's trilogy, The Lord of the Rings, paid them enough. Blanchett played Plead the Fifth on Bravo's Watch What Happens Live. During the segment, host Andy Cohen poses three challenging questions to his guest, who can only veto one.

Cohen questioned Blanchett about which of her roles resulted in the biggest paycheck. The Borderlands actor asked Cohen to make a guess, which is when the host says he assumed that it was Lord of the Rings. To this, Blanchett replied, "Are you kidding me? No, no one got paid anything to do that movie.”

When Cohen asked about Blanchett's share of the movie's box office earnings, she replied, "No, that was way before any of that." According to Blanchett, she agreed to get involved in the movie because she wanted to work with the guy who made Braindead, which was Jackson's 1992 zombie comedy and later released as Dead Alive in the United States.

In Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy, Blanchett played the role of Galadriel, a Middle-Earth royal elf with strong magical talents. The Oscar-winning actor reprised her role in the director's Hobbit film trilogy, which is a prequel to The Lord of the Rings. Regarding her pay, Blanchett quipped saying "I basically got free sandwiches and I got to keep my [elf] ears."

Several Lord of the Rings actors, including Blanchett, have complained about their little pay for the epic fantasy film. Orlando Bloom, who plays Legolas in the three films, claimed to have only received $175,000 for the entire trilogy in a 2019 appearance on The Howard Stern Show. With a global box office total of $2.9 billion, the Lord of the Rings trilogy is among the most financially successful film trilogys.

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