Jay Leno Transcript - 2003

Jay: My first guest is an extremely talented young actor, currently starring in The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King-which opens December 17th, please welcome Elijah Wood.

*Elijah comes out-waves & bows. The band is playing the LOTR music*

Jay: How are you buddy?

Elijah: Very Well

Jay: RETURN OF THE KING!

Elijah: That's very regal music. My god, such a regal entrance.

Jay: It is a regal entrance-(Elijah cuts him off)

Elijah: But I'm not the king, you need Viggo

Jay: That's alright, you are close as we have tonight.

Elijah: So I'll do?

Jay: Forget the movie, I know it's like the biggest movie ever, but forget all that. There's something that's amazed me more than anything else. YOU have finally got you own place. Did I hear that? You've finally moved out of your mom's house?

Elijah: That's right. I think I need a little music for that, guys.

Elijah: I thought you'd like that, Jay.

Jay: I know cause the last time you were here I was teasing you about living at you're mom's house and her folding the socks-

Elijah: Well she still does the laundry and all that stuff-

Jay: So you go over and-

Elijah: No, No, No-Not anymore

Jay: So where's the new place?

Elijah: It's in the flatiron district in Manhattan.

Jay: Oh, so you're in New York?

Elijah: New York.

Jay: Ok, so how does one go about that? I mean you're a young guy...did they recognize you first of all? Or did were they just "this kid wants the apartment..."

Elijah: They were, to be honest, they were nervous about me getting the apartment. 'Cuz I'm an actor, It was kind of a rigorous screening process. Because the building that I'm renting from, the people actually own the building that live in the building. They met my sister and I, who also moved out there with me. They wanted to sit down with us and sort of, have a chat about, well, ask us a lot of questions. You know, do we stay up late at night and have loud parties and that kind of thing. Because I think they had an idea of me that isn't me.

Jay: Well, let me ask you, Do you stay up late and do you have parties?

Elijah: I stay up late, but I don't have parties.

Jay: You don't have parties with your sister? That seems almost creepy.

*Elijah laughs*

Jay: Now you're just back from where, New Zealand?

Elijah: Just back from New Zealand yesterday morning.

Jay: Okay. Which is really today.

Elijah: Yeah.

Jay: So you really just got back an hour ago.

*Elijah laughs*

Elijah: That's right.

Jay: It's confusing.

Elijah: Yeah.

Jay: Now, how long a flight is that?

Elijah: It's about 12 hours.

Jay: Not to bad.

Elijah: Not to bad. But we had just had a massive premiere and parade. 125,000 people in the town of Wellington-the ciry of Wellington, came out for the premiere.

Jay: Now in the parade do you dress like the character or do you dress normally?

Elijah: I dressed normally. I wore a suit. It'd be pretty silly if had to-

Jay: Well I don't know how those things work-not being in

Elijah: Yeah, right.

Jay: Not being an 'actor'

*Elijah laughs*

Jay: Now when you shoot...you shot the whole movie down there, right. So one must go a little stir-crazy just being far from home.

Elijah: A bit, yeah.

Jay: Did you pull pranks, did you do things like that to one another?

Elijah: We pulled some pranks on the set, I mean it was a rigorous schedule. We had to kind of mix it up a bit to sort of ease the tension.

Jay: Yeah.

Elijah: In fact, there was one time when Dom Monaghan, who plays one of the hobbits, and myself we fashioned-well we had this idea, because Viggo, one of the other actors in the film was attacking people's trailers and sort of decorating.

Jay: Attacking the trailers and decorating them?

Elijah: Yeah, sort of spray painting the trailers and coming up with ways to sort of decimate...

Jay: Oh

Elijah: So we came up with this idea, to kind of fashion a turd, you know, a piece of poo.

Jay: I think we know what a turd is. Anybody not know what a turd is? You know, you gotta go, 'You know, poo'

Elijah: You know, poo. I thought I'd clarify it. Um, out of this um, cotton material, we were in getting our feet worked on, which you do when you're a hobbit. So we kind of took this cotton material and painted it. They had lots of colors of paint.

Jay: Turd colors.

Elijah: Yeah, right. They had lots of browns. They did have a poo color.

Jay: This is more information then I wanted, but okay.

Elijah: We sort of molded these wonderful poos that ended up looking very realistic. We set them on his doorstep. I think that went over very well.

Jay: Now let me ask you, when you went to this apartment in New York, did you tell them this poo story?

Elijah: That was not included. It wasn't necessary

Jay: We’ll take a little break, and more with Elijah in a bit.

*Commercials*

Jay: Welcome back we're talking with Elijah Wood from Lord of the Rings. Talking about being in New Zealand. I heard there was quite a bit of drinking that happened on set.

Elijah: Not on set. There was quite a bit of drinking, though. Not on set. There was one kind of experience, well, yeah. There's this fountain in the center of Wellington. That was a point of particular frustration for myself and Dom Monaghan who plays Merry. It's a fountain that's made up of buckets. Colored buckets. And the water sort of comes down from one bucket to the next and the next. But it doesn't actually work. You see, the area surrounding the fountain gets sprayed with water too. So people walk by this thing, and you get water all over yourself. So I thought, 'This is poor engineering, Why would someone create a bucket like this? Or a fountain like this." So on one drunked evening, Dom, myself, and Billy-who's also in the film were walking home and we pass this fountain. And Dom and I look at it, and are like, 'Man, that thing's rubbish.' So Dom's like, 'Lets conquer it.' I said 'Conquer it?' He said, 'Come on lets climb it.' I said okay. So we climb the thing...*laughs* And umm...once we got to the top...what is there to do...

Jay: Right.

Elijah:....but urinate in it. And really show our disgust.

Jay: Right. This is why Americans are loved around the world.

*Elijah laughs*

Jay: We go to a foreign country and we urinate in the fountain.

Elijah: There you go.

Jay: And now the people walking by, rather than just getting sprayed with water, would have urine on them.

Elijah: Possibly, yeah. And Peter, Peter Jackson-the director of our film was pretty upset to find out that we'd down this. I believe he was heard to say, "B-b-b-but I grew up with that fountain." It's a shame. So I felt really bad after that.

Jay: So we have the turd story, and then we have the...

Elijah: I'm just coming up for 10 aren't I?

Jay: Now lets talk about the movie. Now this is the big one, la-dee-da. The king, the whole bit.

Elijah: This is it.

Jay: And it's an amazing series of movies. And you filmed them all at once.

Elijah: Over 16 months in New Zealand.

Jay: So you must be stunned when you watch them. 'Oh, that's where that scene is!' Did you shoot them in order?

Elijah: Completely out of order. But it is one story, so it's not too crazy. But yeah, this is it.

Jay: Well we have a clip, so tell us what's happening here.

Elijah: I believe this is Sam, Frodo, and Gollum. And Sam is attacking Gollum because he suspects him of some villainy. And Frodo is saying that we need to keep Gollum with us.

*show clip*

*cheers after clip*

Jay: oooo. You know I've been trying to figure out who Gollum who looks like. Put Gollum's picture up. And then I realized, It's James Carville. It's an amazing likeness. Amazing.

Elijah: That's fantastic. We should give James a call.

Jay: And you're hosting Saturday Night Live.

Elijah: I am.

Jay: Are you nervous about that.

Elijah: I am. I'm quite nervous. But also very excited, it'll be a good time.

Jay: Have you hosted before?

Elijah: No.

Jay: First time! So you get to be initiated, well I won't tell you...

Elijah: Okaaaay....

Jay: Elijah, congratulations. You do great work. We'll be right back with Jennifer Tilly.

Jennifer Tilly is absolutely hilarious! She talks not so much about the Haunted Mansion, but mostly about relationships. She calls her self "Porky the 'friendly' person" Well these are the couple bits that Elijah responded to.

She was talking about how she misses being in a relationship, and the 'Oh, it's you.' when you come home and what not. Elijah's just sitting there, looking on. And Jay says, 'I think he's mesmerized.' And Elijah leans on his side toward Jennifer and puts his arm around her and rubs her back, and laughs. He was being very over-flirty in a joking way. (I know there are some people who would be like-'WHAT? He was flirting with Jennifer Tilly!')

She was talking about having flings, and feeling regret afterwards, and to Elijah she says, "You've done that haven't you. He's looking confused. But you've done that." Elijah's like, "Noooo" Then she says something I kept missing and he's says, "Yes!!"

Jennifer also says that Liv Tyler looks like a special effect, because she glowed and was beautiful and thought she was on a sound stage. (She was in a sound stage and didn't get to act with Eddie Murphy.)

The best part of the interview was when Elijah was translating British slang for Jennifer. Her ex-boyfriend was British.

Jennifer: 'Ouy, Lovely. Fancy a shag?' Which is British for-

Elijah: Do you want to have sex?

*burst of laughter*

Jennifer: Right, then they say, 'Right then, I'll come around in the morning and knock you up.' Which means-

Elijah: I'll come over in the morning and get you pregnant.

Jennifer: It means there going to ring the doorbell

Elijah: Oh. (Makes a sad face)

That’s about it, after that, Jay ends the interview with Jennifer Tilly, there’s some more commercials, and then the Counting Crows perform.

Thanks so much Malin! :)