Dom: Orlando practiced for this sequence by climbing animals in his down time. We’d be off surfing. Orlando would climb ponies, horses, cows –
Billy: Yea.
Dom: – mules, donkeys.
Billy: But before he got to animals like that, he was on gerbils, hamsters, and, eh –
Dom: *laughs* Remember that time when the rat bit him?
Billy: Bit him right in his…
Dom: He couldn’t go out for days!

[The Lord of the Rings] reinforced my belief in the group ethic. The greatest reward for me [on this film] was getting to know these actors and going through this together—how we got through good times, and especially bad times, together as a group. In that sense I think that Peter cast the movie very well. He picked a group of people who worked well together and didn’t complain too much about the hardships, to the point where the last six months was [a schedule of] six days a week, 16 hours a day—just, ‘Go, go, go,’ no end in sight. And people really did pull together and work as a group. It’s the way that actors should always work, whether it’s in a play or in a movie, and I don’t see that often. That ideal was one that we adhered to. As a result of that effort, I have a group of friends that I’m as close to as anyone I know and who will always be my friends.
- Viggo Mortensen

Alan Lee is a gracious man who was always generous with his talent. He had created the drawing for the tattoo and, before we left, Elijah and I asked another favour from him. We wanted to present something to the crew„ so we asked Alan to sketch an image of Frodo and Sam turning and waving gooodbye. He kindly agreed, of course, and even added Gollum - peering out between our legs. We transferred the image to a card and made hundreds of copies that we signed and distributed as parting gifts.
- Sean Bean

The Fellowship became a reality, We made some of the best friends of our lives. We went through ups and downs together as a single unit. I learned how to surf - we all learned how to surf. We took vacations together. It was so special and profound. This is not just a film, not for anyone involved. It was life for us.
- Elijah Wood

When we were first at sword-training we were like, ‘Oh ****… This is like old-school Hollywood.’ You hear about this when they’d take Kirk Douglas to practise speech and sword-training. To break the tension, Billy and I had a routine and we ended up kissing. Everyone loved it, so at the opening party, there was a stage set up and we were asked if we’d do our little routine and if there could be a little hobbit-on-hobbit kissing to set the mood.
- Sean Astin