I would like to give thanks on behalf of everyone here as visitors

for this ceremony, for this celebration, for the blessing of the sound stage

and for the welcome that you offer to us.

We're all deeply honored to be here.

And to everyone who has waited so long for this day to begin

this extraordinary journey filming The Hobbit

I would like to wish them good luck, good health and good harmony.

And Martin would like to say something.

Thank you. My name is Martin Freeman and I'm in the cast as well.

He stole everything I was about to say in Maori.

As Richard said, this has been a long time coming today.

It's been even longer than we hoped it would be.

So at the end of this journey we are all as close with each other

as at the moment we have the potential to be.

So thank you very much.

Hello everybody, I'm Andy Serkis.

I am standing up just to say on behalf of the returning crew and cast

who have come gathered here to go on the journey.

And we're just very very grateful to your incredible hospitality

and to the opportunity to share the passion for telling

such an amazing amazing story in

such an amazing country with such beautiful people. Thank you.

You know, for a long time I thought that going back to the

amazing experience of The Lord of the Rings wouldn't be a good idea.

But really now I've come completely around because films are stressful

and they're hard to make.

But ultimately what makes them fun is the people that you work with.

And the fact that we're going to be working with a lot of the old gang,

with a lot of friends, and obviously making some new friends

is really the point of being here.

So I'm extremely thrilled.

If somebody came up to me today and said that we could carry on

pre-production for another six weeks, I'd say,

"No, no. Hell no, let's just start shooting."