Peter Jackson Reveals Stephen Colbert Has Been Writing a New LORD OF THE RINGS Movie for the Past Year

As we previously learned Stephen Colbert has been working on a brand-newLord of the Rings movie with Peter Jacksonand the project has been in development for over a year already.

While speaking with Variety at the Cannes Film Festival, where Jackson received an honorary Palme d’Or, the filmmaker opened up for the first time about how this unexpected collaboration came together.

According to Jackson, Colbert personally reached out with an idea for a Middle-earth story long before CBS canceled The Late Show.

Jackson explained: “He phoned me up a year ago — before he knew his show was going to finish — and said, ‘I don’t know if you’re interesting, but I’ve got an idea for a Tolkien movie based on the books that I think would be really good.'”

That pitch clearly landed. Jackson was impressed enough to connect Colbert with longtime creative partner Philippa Boyens, who co-wrote both The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit trilogies.

What started as a conversation quickly evolved into a serious writing process, with the trio spending the last year developing a treatment for the film. Colbert even traveled to New Zealand to work closely with the team.

Then came the sudden cancellation of The Late Show, which Jackson says caught everyone off guard. In Jackson’s view, having a massive fantasy project to dive into ended up being a welcome creative outlet for Colbert during a rough moment.

He said: “I think Steven’s actually really happy — I think it helped him process [something that] what was rather shocking. So it was like, okay, one day he’s going to be a late night talk show host, and the next day he’s going to be a Tolkien scriptwriter.”

The upcoming film was first teased by Jackson back in March through a video announcement. The project is currently using the working title The Lord of the Rings: Shadows of the Pastand will arrive after Andy Serkis’ upcoming Middle-earth movie The Hunt for Gollum.

The screenplay is being written by Colbert, his son Peter McGee, and Boyens. The official synopsis reads:

“Fourteen years after the passing of Frodo — Sam, Merry and Pippin set out to retrace the first steps of their adventure. Meanwhile, Sam’s daughter, Elanor, has discovered a long-buried secret and is determined to uncover why the War of the Ring was very nearly lost before it even began.”

Colbert is zeroing in on a very specific part of Tolkien's story, chapters three through eight of The Fellowship of the Ring, including the wonderfully creepy "Fog on the Barrow-downs.”

And if there’s one thing everyone knows about Colbert, it’s that his love for Tolkien runs deep. Jackson even admitted: “never met anyone who knows more about Tolkien”

This also isn’t the first time Colbert has stepped into Jackson’s version of Middle-earth. He had a cameo in 2013’s The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug and later directed Jackson along with Lord of the Rings stars Ian McKellen, Viggo Mortensen, and Elijah Wood in the 2019 short film Darrylgorn.

A Stephen Colbert-written Lord of the Rings movie honestly wasn’t on anybody’s bingo card, but now that it’s real, it’s hard not to be curious about what this team comes up with.

Between Boyens’ storytelling instincts and Colbert’s encyclopedic Tolkien knowledge, this could end up being a pretty awesome new chapter in Middle-earth history.