'Martin Freeman has the biggest Hobbit feet ever!'

'Martin Freeman has the biggest Hobbit feet ever!' (Image credit: PA Wire/Press Association Images)

Martin Freeman's hobbit walk has got the thumbs up from director Peter Jackson. The Office star takes the lead role as Bilbo Baggins in the Lord of the Rings prequel, which is currently filming in New Zealand. "He fits the ears, and he's got some very nice feet. I think he's got the biggest hobbit feet we've had so far," the director told Entertainment Weekly. "They're a little bit hard to walk in, but he's managed to figure out the perfect hobbit gait." In three sneak peek film stills released to the magazine, Martin as Bilbo is seen reading a letter, while Sir Ian McKellen is seen reprising his role as Gandalf in another image. "He's in fantastic form," Peter said of Sir Ian. "In a way, his role in The Hobbit has more technical difficulties than Lord of the Rings did, because he has scenes with 14 smaller characters - obviously the dwarves and the hobbit are shorter. I remember saying to him, 'Look, this isn't Waiting For Godot or King Lear. This is The Hobbit. This is the real thing.'" The first part of The Hobbit is scheduled for released in December 2012, with the second part due in 2013.

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Patrick McLennan is a London-based journalist and documentary maker who has worked as a writer, sub-editor, digital editor and TV producer in the UK and New Zealand. His CV includes spells as a news producer at the BBC and TVNZ, as well as web editor for Time Inc UK. He has produced TV news and entertainment features on personalities as diverse as Nick Cave, Tom Hardy, Clive James, Jodie Marsh and Kevin Bacon and he co-produced and directed The Ponds, which has screened in UK cinemas, BBC Four and is currently available on Netflix.

An entertainment writer with a diverse taste in TV and film, he lists Seinfeld, The Sopranos, The Chase, The Thick of It and Detectorists among his favourite shows, but steers well clear of most sci-fi.