Elijah Wood is sharing secrets from Middle-earth.
The “Lord of the Rings” actor, 44, participated in a Q&A at a panel at Fan Expo Portland over the weekend and revealed that the famous line “All right then, keep your secrets” that Frodo (Wood) says to Gandalf (Ian McKellen) almost didn’t happen.
“That scene was actually shot during pickups,” Wood told a Collider reporter who was moderating the panel.
“It was not shot during principal photography,” he added. “I’m pretty sure that sequence was from pickups.”
Frodo’s quote made the final cut of 2001’s “The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring,” which kicked off the fantasy film franchise based on J.R.R. Tolkien’s novel.
During the panel, Wood also spoke about the grueling process of doing pickup shoots for “Lord of the Rings.”
“Obviously, the folks who had a lot of makeup had the earliest pickup times,” he explained. “I think Lurtz, the Uruk-hai, was picked up just around midnight to then be put in makeup for five or six hours. My earliest pickup was during the first pickups in Osgiliath, and I think it was 3:30 in the morning. It was brutal.”
Wood starred in Peter Jackson’s epic adventure films alongside McKellen, Dominic Monaghan, Sean Astin, Billy Boyd, Cate Blanchett, Orlando Bloom, and more. “The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers” came out in 2002 and “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King” came out in 2003.
At the 2025 Texas Film Awards, Wood revealed that the cast of the trilogy did not end up with a big pay day – despite the franchise collectively making $2.9 billion at the worldwide box office.
“Because we weren’t making one movie and then renegotiating a contract for the next, it wasn’t the sort of lucrative scenario that you could sort of rest easy for the rest of your life,” the actor told Business Insider.
Wood added, “The benefit of that was that we were also signing up for something that was going to be a part of our lives forever.”
The “Lord of the Rings” franchise is continuing with “The Hunt for Gollum,” set to be directed by Gollum actor Andy Serkis.
McKellen, 86, hinted last year that he and Wood are returning as Gandalf and Frodo, respectively, in the 2027 film.
“There’s a character in the movie called Frodo and there’s another character called Gandalf,” McKellen said at a fan event in Aug. 2025. “Apart from that, my lips are sealed.”
