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  1. Entertainment
  2. TV
  3. Fantasy Shows

Lord of the Rings TV show actor drops out after filming multiple episodes

News
By Emily Garbutt published 16 March 2021

"Amazon has decided to go in another direction with the character I was portraying..."

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The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
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An actor in the Lord of the Rings TV show has dropped out of the Amazon Prime series, despite already filming multiple episodes. Tom Budge was cast in the show in early 2020, although the secrecy surrounding the project means it was never confirmed what character he was playing.

"It is with great sadness that I am writing to tell you I have departed Amazon's Lord Of The Rings television series," Budge wrote on Instagram. "After recently seeing the first episodes shot over the last year Amazon has decided to go in another direction with the character I was portraying...  

"I must thank the creative team for their encouragement towards trying something that I believed was new, exciting and beautiful. And I sincerely thank the extraordinary cast and crew for their love, support and friendship over what has been a very difficult and unusual experience. Alas, some things just cannot be."

A post shared by Tom Budge (@tombudgeofecal)

A photo posted by on

The series will take place in Middle-earth’s fabled Second Age of history, thousands of years before the events of J.R.R. Tolkien's books. Amazon Studios confirmed that the series will begin in a time of relative peace and follow an ensemble cast of characters, both familiar (some of the residents of Middle-earth have very different lifespans to humans, after all) and new, as they confront the long-feared re-emergence of evil to their world. 

Who these familiar faces may be has yet to be announced, but Morfydd Clark will reportedly be back as Galadriel and Elrond is expected to play a part in the story, too. Played by Hugo Weaving in the movies, there’s no word who has been cast to play him in the series.

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There's no release date for the Lord of the Rings TV show to arrive on the streamer, but in the meantime you can check out our list of the best shows on Amazon Prime to watch right now.

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TOPICS
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Emily Garbutt
Emily Garbutt
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Emily Garbutt is a former Entertainment Writer at GamesRadar+ who covered everything film and TV-related. Emily helped bring you all the latest news, features, and reviews, and helmed a Big Screen Spotlight column. She has previously written for publications like HuffPost and i-D after getting a NCTJ Diploma in Multimedia Journalism, and is now a freelance writer.

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