Sean Bean Was Reading Lines During His Famous ‘Lord of the Rings’ Speech

Sean Bean had one of the most famous moments in the Lord of the Rings film trilogy, but it almost didn’t happen.

Bean appeared on the Oct. 2 episode of the Happy Sad Confused podcast with host Josh Horowitz, where he talked about his long career in film and television and his on-screen journey to Middle Earth.

In 2001’s The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, Bean played Boromir of Gondor. He agrees to become part of the fellowship that will help Frodo (Elijah Wood) bring the ring to Mordor to destroy it, though he’s tempted by the ring’s power in his quest to save Gondor. After he tries to steal the ring from Frodo, the company is attacked by orcs, and he’s mortally wounded trying to save the Hobbits. He dies after Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen) promises to save Gondor. 

In one of the trilogy’s most iconic moments, Bean’s Boromir utters the now-iconic (and often-memed) line, “One does not simply walk into Mordor” during the scene where the fellowship is formed at The Council of Elrond. But Bean revealed on Happy Sad Confused that some of his much-praised gravitas during that scene was because he was reading his lines off a card.

Howoritz said that director and writer Peter Jackson admitted that he couldn’t figure out exactly what he wanted Bean as Boromir to say and was rewriting it until the last minute, so he needed a “cheat sheet” to remember the words.

“That was just changing every 10 minutes,” Bean explained. It was also “quite” detailed with “all the history.” 

“I just had a bit of card. That’s why I kept looking down,” Bean said. “And it gave me gravitas,” he said with a laugh, mimicking himself talking, then dramatically pausing to check his next line. 

Horowitz asked if the “memefication” of Borormir’s speech “sits well” with Bean. “It’s on a lot of football forums,” Bean said. “One does not simply lose to Crystal Palace. Movies apply to anything.”

Bean also told the host that he initially didn’t audition for Boromir, but for Aragorn. One of the producers was “quite keen” on him playing that role, but he ultimately ended up with the Boromir role. “But then Viggo came along and he made a magnificent Aragorn,” he said. 

“We had a great relationship together, as characters in the film and also as people, as friends,” he said of Mortensen.

Bean “didn’t realize how big” the movie would ultimately be because filming was “quite secretive.” He remembered, “They wanted to keep it under wraps. Even when we were filming in New Zealand, it’s so quiet over there, was so far away from any studios.”

“Also because they were like 12 hours ahead, so by the time Peter had shot what he wanted so they couldn’t really change it in the studio in L.A.,” Bean remembered with a laugh. 

The Fellowship of the Ring made over $800 million worldwide at the box office and won four Oscars. 2002’s The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers and 2003’s The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King built upon that critical and commercial success. The three movies combined won 17 Oscars with 30 nominations.

Bean’s Boromir is one in a long line of characters the actor has played that die during a story, a legacy that includes his Game of Thrones character Ned Stark and his appearances in GoldenEye, The Island and Patriot Games, among others. In 2019, he revealed that he started to turn down projects where his character dies because the trend made the deaths “predictable.”

Bean stars alongside Daniel Day-Lewis in the new film Anemone, directed by Lewis’ son Ronan.