There's a popular urban myth that The Beatles once hoped to make their own The Lord of the Rings movie - what was actually going on, and why didn't it happen? In 2020, The Lord of the Rings on film is entirely associated with the work of Peter Jackson, who first adapted J.R.R. Tolkien's famous trilogy and then went back to work on The Hobbit. An incomplete animated Lord of the Rings film directed by Ralph Bakshi was released in 1978 to some success, but this has largely been eclipsed by the live-action blockbusters. However, a very different Lord of the Rings movie almost saw the light of day thanks to 1960s music phenomenon, The Beatles.
This concept isn't actually as strange as it sounds. In decades past, it wasn't unusual for wildly popular music artists to have a strong presence in movie theaters. Despite being predominantly known as the King of Pop, Elvis Presley carved out a considerable acting career and bands such as Pink Floyd and The Who released feature-length movies based entirely around their music. The Beatles themselves enjoyed a string of cinematic hits such as Help! and A Hard Days Night. As such, the idea of The Beatles adapting Tolkien perhaps wasn't outlandish was it would be today.
The Beatles' interest in adapting The Lord of the Rings came from Denis O'Dell, who had helped produce the band's previous big screen musical efforts. With one more film left on The Beatles' contract with United Artists, O'Dell thought his Fab Four would be ideally suited to the work of Tolkien, and that Frodo's tale could be turned into a live-action adventure starring the band. Of course, the film would've been a musical, featuring new tunes from John, Paul, George and Ringo. After hearing O'Dell's idea, The Beatles themselves were keen on pressing ahead, having been fans of the original books.
In the years since, it has been confirmed that Paul McCartney would've portrayed protagonist Frodo, John Lennon would've been Gollum, George Harrison was set to play Gandalf and Ringo Starr would appear as Samwise Gamgee. As luck would have it, United Artists were also interested in making a Lord of the Rings movie, meaning there was interest from the band, their management and their contracted studio - the stars appeared to have aligned on The Beatles coming to Middle-earth.
Unfortunately, two major obstacles would halt the project in its tracks, the first being a struggle to land a big-name director. John Lennon was reportedly the driving force behind The Beatles' Lord of the Rings movie and was eyeing Stanley Kubrick to direct the feature. While Kubrick also had an affinity for the source material, he was skeptical about the feasibility of bringing Tolkien to live-action in the 1960s, and after failing to land their man, The Beatles began to lose interest in the idea altogether. Another major setback came directly from Tolkien himself. According to Peter Jackson, The Beatles' journey to Mount Doom was killed off completely because Tolkien at this juncture still held the rights to his story and, not being an especially big fan of the band, refused to let four musicians on copious amounts of drugs adapt his life's work.
While the prospect is undoubtedly intriguing, especially considering Tolkien's mind-melting Tom Bombadil chapters, it's perhaps a blessing that The Beatles' Lord of the Rings film never got made. The musical, comedic and trippy nature of the band's past cinematic efforts would've been a poor fit for the world of Tolkien, undoubtedly upsetting the books' fans in the process. Moreover, translating a believable Middle-earth into live-action was enough of a challenge in the early 2000s - to do so 40 years earlier would've been nigh-on impossible. Although the draw of The Beatles would've guaranteed a profit for all involved, a critical panning might've tainted The Lord of the Rings as a viable movie venture and scuppered plans for a proper adaptation in later years.