He will not go through unemployment. American host and comedian Stephen Colbert will devote himself to writing a new part of the “Lord of the Rings” saga after the end of his show “The Late Show” on May 21, Deadline reveals this Tuesday, March 24.
Provisionally titled “The Lord of the Rings: Shadow of the Past”, this new opus of the saga adapted from the books of JRR Tolkien must be written by Stephen Colbert, Philippa Boyens and Peter McGee, son of the famous TV host. The one who has presented the “Late Show” since 2015 revealed that the film will be inspired by “Fog on the Heights of the Barrows”, the eighth chapter of “The Fellowship of the Ring”, in which the Hobbits are trapped by a specter within a supernatural fog. The action takes place 14 years after the death of Frodo.
The story will also feature a fan-favorite character who was omitted from previous films: Tom Bombadil. However, it will still take several years for the project to see the light of day. A film from the saga will even be released well before since “The Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum” is due to be released on December 17, 2027.
A new project as he prepares to leave CBS
“You know what books mean to me and what your films mean to me, but what I found myself rereading over and over again were the first six chapters of The Fellowship of the Ring that you never adapted into the first film at the time,” Stephen Colbert said in a video with Peter Jackson, the director of the saga films.
As a big fan of “Lord of the Rings”, the man who succeeded David Letterman at the head of one of the flagship programs of American television, wanted to reassure other aficionados: he aims to “create something which is totally faithful to the books while remaining totally faithful to the films”.
The 61-year-old host will leave CBS in May after 11 years at the helm of the program. The cessation of the show caused an earthquake in the United States, on the air since 1993. “I am not being replaced. All of this is disappearing,” said Stephen Colbert, who has been at odds with the channel since a $16 million deal concluded with Donald Trump in July.
