Roxy and Wētā

Before we came to New Zealand, the promised tour of Wētā Workshop was one of the things I most looked forward to. The day was about to be a great one. First, though, we had lunch at Coco Restaurant in the Roxy Cinema. As always, similar to the other locations that I had not even heard of prior to the tour, this one was excellent, and not least because it involved food.

The Roxy began in 1928 as a cinema for silent films. In 1932 it was converted so that “talkies” could be shown. It was shut down in 1964 for disrepair and remained that way for a long time. With the growing movie industry in New Zealand, Camperdown Studio Group purchased the building with the intent of restoring it.

Jamie & Ann Selkirk, and Tania & Richard Taylor, who had worked on the Lord of the Rings movies, found a hospitality partner and began work to reopen the theatre. In 2011, it was reopened with a party attended by members of the cast and crew of the LOTR movies. It remains open today, and is full of marvelous things to look at.

After eating as much as we could take, it was time to move on to Wētā. Named after a large cricket-like insect, this special-effects and movie prop company was founded in 1987 by Richard Taylor and Tania Rodger. Like other New Zealand movie-related companies, this one got a huge boost with its participation in the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit movies (though they had worked with Peter Jackson before, his earlier movies were not as successful). I knew about Wētā Workshop from having watched the LOTR appendices over and over, and I could identify Richard Taylor and Tania Rodger on sight if I had the opportunity.

We were going to get a tour of the workshop and I could not wait to see it match what I had seen in the appendices.

The tour group from Red Carpet Tours was amped with excitement and we could hardly wait to get inside. The room we entered was built to look like we were in a cave, and it was packed full of props and we became even more excited.

Our Wētā guide told us that for the entire tour, we were not allowed to take any photos. So I cannot show you. I can describe it as similar to the photos above: with life-sized characters like a Dwarf, a Na’vi, King Kong, and the Professor from Jurrassic Park. There were many life-sized fantasical weapons from video games that we were allowed to handle, since none of them were real weapons. There were many swords, knives, axes, and bow and arrows from the different productions of Wētā. We got to see some video demonstrations of their special effects, like the way they created the character Alita, that Pedro likes. We saw Hobbit foot molds and wigs and robots and miniatures like a 5 foot high castle, and costumes, suits of armor, and multiple crowns, helmets, and shields. We got to see the actual uruk head on a sword, mounted as a warning after the Rohirrim wiped out the orc and uruk-hai company in Rohan.

We were not allowed to take photos because all of these things were the real things: the real prop either used in the movie, or made to be used in the movie. Wētā does not own those props after they create them, the various movie production companies do, so rather than keep track of all the many legal permissions needed, if they could even get them, we just had to try and look at everything and remember. Like the old days before cellphones, ha ha.

In the gentlest way possible to say it, the tour was not what I was expecting, and that bummed me out just a little bit. I still found the tour amazingly cool! Cool as it was, I wanted to see the actual workshop. I wanted to see real Wētā employees behind glass, away from nosy tourists, hunkered over lumps of clay sculpting, or mixing latex, or eyes bulging in front of a giant computer screen, inventing some new awesome graphics program. It was more like a museum. Which was really neat, but not what I was hoping for.

The next thing we did made up for that bit of disappointment: I got to build real chain mail in Wētā Workshop. Ok, not exactly, but so close I’m just going to say it because THAT is a total nerd dream come true!

After our tour was done, we all sat down at tables and were told we were going to learn how to build chains the way that chain mail is built. There were two actual Wētā employees; Sully was the one at the table Pedro and I sat at. We were shown a couple of ways to build a rope chain, using different materials and creating different patterns.

Both of us impressed the trainers. Pedro’s super cool overlapping chain in gold and blue was long enough to go around his wrist (the group before us apparently didn’t have enough time for most people to make a long enough chain). And at our table we had two people (Cameron and me) who decided to use the steel links and try for the twisted cord you see there, which they told us was more difficult.

The colored links were of aluminum and smaller sized wire, and could be twisted by fingers. The steel links were so hard to bend that we had to use two pliers at once (one in each hand) to protect our hands, and even that didn’t really protect our hands after a while. I had so much fun pushing myself to work with real chain links. I developed a great respect for people who build real chain mail. The resulting bruises and calluses for professionals must be awful.

After that, we went to Wētā Cave, which is the official store that sells all the wicked awesome movie and game props that are available to consumers. There were several things Pedro and I would have liked to buy, but our taste is excellent, and the things were liked were especially expensive, and remained on the shelf.

This place was also cave-like, and packed full of things you could buy and things not for sale and just there to be admired. We all admired.

It was a marvelous day.

Our evening was free, and the two Italians were planning a gathering of the whole tour for dinner and drinks. I enthusiastically said we would come. By the time evening came, however, I could not find the energy. My small cough from days before had become a persistent hard cough. I was not sleeping well due to coughing, and keeping Pedro awake too. I managed to keep my energy up during the daytime, but by evening I was always absolutely wiped out. My man and I had an excellent dinner across the street from the hotel, and then I fell directly to sleep.