The Hobbit actor recreates barrel experience at Shotover Canyon Swing

Queenstown's Shotover Canyon Swing has enabled an actor from the world-famous The Hobbit movie trilogy to recreate his favourite scene from The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug.

Jed Brophy, who plays Nori the dwarf in the movies, was in Queenstown as part of a charity appearance for the local Wakatipu Youth Booth and decided to do the Shotover Canyon Swing Hobbit Barrel Jump as he'd "always wanted to do it".

The new jump, which saw him fall off the Swing platform in a wine barrel, was created especially by the Swing team to recognise one of the key scenes in the second movie.

The Shotover Canyon Swing location was perfect to recreate the now famous scene in which Bilbo and the dwarves escape the dungeons of the Elvenking Thranduil by bouncing and spinning down a river's rapids in a bunch of barrels, pursued by both elves and orcs.

Speaking after his jump yesterday, Brophy who, hails from Taihape in the North Island, said the Shotover Canyon Swing Hobbit Barrel Jump was "a lot scarier than actually doing the barrel run in the movie."

He stated "that was so bloody awesome and flipping scary. The worst part was not knowing when it was actually gonna happen - the anticipation nearly killed me.

"The jump guys were seriously messing with me, so I had no idea when I was about to drop."

"The barrel scene is by far my favourite in the movie, so to get the chance to recreate it here in the stunning Queenstown surroundings was brilliant."

Brophy went on to say how much he'd enjoyed filming the movies in his home country, adding "this is a truly spectacular place we live in.

"I'm so proud to be a Kiwi and all the actors raved about how wonderful New Zealand is. The scenery, people and whole ambience is amazing."

"Plus I love how innovative the New Zealand film industry is and I certainly see a lot more movies being made here in the future, which is great for Kiwi actors and the whole country's economy."

"It's that good old Kiwi ingenuity that makes it just work for us. The Shotover Canyon Swing is another great example of that - thinking outside the square and coming up with something totally random and becoming extremely successful at it."

Shotover Canyon Swing Marketing Projects Manager Stephen Thompson said the jump team had "an absolute ball" conjuring up the new jump.

Thompson explained "the guys love finding new, scary and out there ways of jumping and the Hobbit Barrel Jump is perfect for the Swing.

"As soon as we heard about The Hobbit's famous barrel scene and that we had Jed Brophy coming out we knew we had to recreate it here as we've got the ideal set-up."

"Who better to be our guinea pig than Nori the dwarf? Jed loved it and raved about coming back to jump again."

Brophy has already completed many other Queenstown activities but hadn't had the chance to do the Shotover Canyon Swing until last weekend, concluding "it's definitely been on my bucket list and I'm already planning my return and what jump I'll do next time and with who. You never know I may be able to persuade Peter Jackson to do it."

For more information go to www.facebook.com/ShotoverCanyonSwing

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