{"id":713612,"date":"2026-07-27T13:23:12","date_gmt":"2026-07-27T13:23:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/713612\/"},"modified":"2026-07-27T13:23:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-27T13:23:12","slug":"lord-of-the-rings-star-sean-astin-admits-making-not-a-lot-of-money-from-trilogy-i-had-to-sell-my-house","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/713612\/","title":{"rendered":"Lord of the Rings star Sean Astin admits making \u2018not a lot of money\u2019 from trilogy: \u2018I had to sell my house\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The Lord of the Rings<\/a> trilogy made billions at the box office, but actor Sean Astin<\/a> has admitted that his salary was so \u201dsmall\u201d he had to sell his house.<\/p>\n

A former child star who rose to fame at 13 as the star of The Goonies, Astin is best known to audiences for his role as the loyal Samwise Gamgee in Peter Jackson\u2019s epic film series.<\/p>\n

In a new interview, the actor, who starred in the three Lord of the Rings films between 2001 and 2003, told The Guardian<\/a> that while starring in the franchise gave him a \u201clevel of visibility and access\u201d he was unprepared for, the financials left much to be desired.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was a disconnect between the attention that I was getting and how much money we had,\u201d the 55-year-old said. \u201cIt was not a lot of money! In fact, I had to sell my house because I negotiated such a small amount on the trilogy.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"AstinAstin said that there was a \u2018disconnect\u2019 between the film\u2019s success and the cast\u2019s salaries (Getty)<\/p>\n

Back in 2017, actor and trade union leader Astin revealed in an interview that he was paid $250,000 (\u00a3190,000) to appear in the trilogy, adding that he got \u201cno residuals\u201d either.<\/p>\n

Directed by Peter Jackson, the Lord of the Rings films were blockbusters. Made on a budget of around $281m (\u00a3214m), they brought in $2.9bn (\u00a32.2bn) worldwide.<\/p>\n

That this was not reflected in the cast\u2019s salaries has been touched on by members of the ensemble<\/a> in interviews over the years.<\/p>\n

Appearing on Watch What Happens Live, Cate Blanchett, who played Galadriel in the JRR Tolkien adaptation, said that \u201dno one got paid anything to do that movie\u201d, before jokingly adding: \u201dI basically got free sandwiches, and I got to keep my ears as pay.\u201d<\/p>\n

Elijah Wood, who played Astin\u2019s on-screen best friend (and the franchise\u2019s lead) Frodo Baggins, also opened up about the pay issue<\/a> last April.<\/p>\n

Wood explained that production company New Line Cinema had taken \u201ca real gamble\u201d on the massive ensemble cast, leading to an \u201cunderstandable\u201d trade-off where the cast were on \u201cnot massive salaries\u201d as a result.<\/p>\n

\"ElijahElijah Wood (left) and Sean Astin in 2004, one year after the final Lord of the Rings film was released (Getty)<\/p>\n

The actors also shot the films back to back, Wood explained, and \u201cbecause we weren\u2019t making one movie and then renegotiating a contract for the next, it wasn\u2019t the sort of lucrative scenario that you could sort of rest easy for the rest of your life,\u201d he revealed.<\/p>\n

The actor disagreed with rumours that he was paid $250,000 (\u00a3190,000) to star in the first instalment, The Fellowship of the Ring, saying that it \u201cdoesn\u2019t matter\u201d what the real number was.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe benefit of that was that we were also signing up for something that was going to be a part of our lives forever,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Orlando Bloom, who played Legolas, said in 2017 that he received $175,000 (\u00a3133,000) for all three films.<\/p>\n

\u201cNothing, nothing, nothing. I got nothing. 175 grand for three movies,\u201d he said, going on to clarify: \u201cNo, listen, greatest gift of my life, are you kidding me? Would do it again for half the money.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":713613,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[236342,96,2839,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-713612","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-celebrity-entertainment-film-lord-of-the-rings-movie-return-of","tag-entertainment","tag-movies","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/713612","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=713612"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/713612\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/713613"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=713612"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=713612"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=713612"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}