The hero hobbit of Heaton Chapel returned to his Stockport school to tell drama students about his own epic tale.

Former pupil Dominic Monaghan, 25, who plays the hapless halfling Merry in the blockbuster Lord of the Rings, visited St Anne’s RC School’s drama department.

Fresh from wrestling Orcs, Cave Trolls and a Balrog in Middle Earth to protect ring-bearer Frodo Baggins from the evils of the dark Lord Sauron, actor Dominic encouraged students to begin their own heroic journeys.

“I spent the most informative years of my childhood at St Anne’s,” he said. “Acting was something I thought was a bit of a dream.

“When I was doing school plays I was told I was pretty good at it. The teachers at St Anne’s were really good, quite positive, they never tried to play down my ambition.”

He told young hopefuls at the school: “You have to immerse yourself in acting, read plays and watch a lot of movies, study your favourite actors and directors and the movies they made.

“I was writing plays and making up characters early on. I think you should go to a youth theatre every week, so you can talk to other young actors and get advice.”

The actor spent 18 months learning to ride and fighting fictional beasts in the dramatic New Zealand landscape filming all three parts of the Tolken trilogy.

Dominic now lives in LA and has several film projects in the pipeline. But he discovered his passion for acting at St Ann’s and still admires his former teachers for nurturing him.

His big break was a part in the BBC hit Hetty Wainthrop Investigates, which came off the back of a Manchester Youth Theatre project.

“I was not the best footballer in the world or the best at maths but found I could excel at drama and read up about it,” he said.

Stockport Express

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