EXCLUSIVE: Sam Hazeldine & Robert Strange Talk Becoming Their Characters in Season 2 of ‘The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power’

Sam Hazeldine and Robert Strange sat down to chat about the upcoming second season of Prime Video’s hit show, The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. The new season is set to premiere on the streaming platform this coming Thursday, August 29.

During the chat, the duo talked the process it takes to become their character, Hazeldine taking over the role of Adar,  their characters motives this season, and so much more. Check out what they had to say below.

Can you talk about the process it takes to become your characters?

Sam Hazeldine: “It’s a long time.”

Robert Strange: “It’s pretty arduous. It’s about four or five hours in total for the orcs, I’d say, depending on the orc. There’s a lot of makeup, prosthetics, costume, et cetera. But we’ve been blessed with the prosthetics team who are just so incredible, such artists so incredible at what they do and so wonderful to… You’re sitting in a chair with these people- “

Sam Hazeldine: “And the nicest people.”

Robert Strange: “-for six hours and they make it fly by.”

What do you do during the six hours?

Sam Hazeldine: “We talk. We’re kind of pretty in tune, actually. Sometimes we’d all, we wouldn’t talk about it, but just be feeling quieter and we’d just sit and work and that was it. But other times we’d do a lot of chatting. Mostly chatting and being silly.”

Robert Strange: “Yeah, for sure. Playing music or just kind of staring into your own reflection, contemplating your decisions.”

Sam, you are new to the team, you are getting back the Adar role. Gow was it to take a role that was for played by someone else in Season 1?

Sam Hazeldine: “Well, I’ve said this a few times, but it was actually a real pleasure to take it on from where Joseph [Mawle] brought it along already because I really liked what he did first season, Adar was actually my favorite character. If you were taking over from someone whose decisions you hadn’t liked or they didn’t do stuff, that would be difficult. But this was the opposite, so it was good to then take it forward, not necessarily in different direction and certainly not intentionally, but we don’t look alike, but it’s very clearly the same character. I think just carrying the baton from there and moving on with it was good.”

Have you watched Season 2?

Sam Hazeldine: “I’ve seen the first three episodes of the season and they weren’t quite finished.  There was work to do, yeah, but I haven’t seen… So lots of the stuff we saw in the trailer and in the behind the scenes thing, it’s all new, so I’m going to watch it when it comes on immediately. I’m excited.”

Robert Strange: “I’m going to watch just my scenes.”

Sam Hazeldine: “Yeah. And then just fast-forward the rest.”

Robert Strange: “I’ll definitely be watching it. I’ll try not to watch it all in one go. I’ll try and spread it out. What’s lovely is we’re all in such different worlds, so you hear about Cynthia’s [Addai-Robinson] swimming and someone’s in the desert but- “

Sam Hazeldine: “Max [Maxim Baldry] is in the mud.”

Robert Strange: “-you don’t really see it. So, when we actually saw all this footage for the first time, it’s so exciting.”

Do you have access to everyone else’s storylines?

Sam Hazeldine: “Oh yeah, we do, we just look it up.”

Robert Strange: “You read people are falling in a mud pit and you’re like, ‘Huh.’”

Sam Hazeldine: “Just wash your hands of that.”

What are your motives this season? Where do we see the characters and what are you up to?

Sam Hazeldine: “Well, I think certain characters, I was going to say from all of the different worlds within the show, have a similar motive which is to try and work out what to do about the fact that Sauron’s returned, and we have to act now and we have to act quickly. There’s a lot of tentative negotiations between different races, which comes with problems and that’s the main thing that’s going on, I would say, for us in the show.”

Robert Strange: “I think just to talk for Gloug, who’s this new orc character for season two. He’s one of Ardar’s inner circle.”

Sam Hazeldine: “He’s his right-hand orc.”

Robert Strange: “But what’s fun to explore with Gloug, which is something a little bit new, is this concept that orcs have layers and complexity to them. They’re not just warriors bent on evil. They have their own lives going on. They have even families that we’re exploring. Then how does that then affect the fact that they are still searching for a home or establishing their home and the fact that they’re being slaughtered left, right, and center and that they’re being sent to war yet again. It creates an interesting dynamic between Gloug and the father of the orcs, Adar.”

Talking about Gloug, there is quite a specific physicality to the role in the way that orc moves and work. How did you prepare for this role?

Robert Strange: “A good preparation is sitting in a makeup chair for seven hours because you just stand up. Well, I have to give credit to Lula, our amazing movement director and Leith [McPherson] who’s the dialect coach, because they really help. We have all this teeth and costume and prosthetics going on. They really helped with the accent, with the physicality and the fact that I’ve been lucky enough to play a series of different orcs through the two seasons. I want to make them all different. Just try and stay fit and healthy and just play. It’s like playing monsters as a child, but as a grownup. So, you just kind of play around with it and see what shapes come out.”

How long does it take to get all the prosthetics off of you and shower?

Robert Strange: “If I’m really tired, I will be like, ‘Get it off.’ But it takes about an hour. You have to kind of scrub all the makeup.”

Sam Hazeldine: “It takes me an hour as well.”

Last season was really dark. Is this season going to be darker?

Sam Hazeldine: “I think definitely darker than the first season and its really kind of fast out the gates. We know all of the worlds, all the characters now. It starts very, very powerfully and there’s a sort of impetus to it. What’s the word I’m looking for? Forward motion.”

Robert Strange: “Like a drive.”

Sam Hazeldine: “A drive, yeah. It’s a lot faster moving I would say than the first few episodes of the first series doing the world building thing.”

Robert Strange: “I think a lot of the characters in all the worlds are finding themselves in more and more complex dynamics and relationships and situations, and we’re going to see them kind of get tested in different ways.”

Sam Hazeldine: “It’s a race against time with Sauron back, so we have to move quickly.”

Make sure to check out the first three episodes when they premiere on Thursday!

*This interview has been edited for length and clarity