Sean Bean - Career - The Lord of The Rings

Arguably, Bean's most prominent role was as Boromir in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings trilogy. His major screen-time occurs in the first installment, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. He appeared briefly in flashbacks in the theatre releases of The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King; he also appears in a scene from the extended edition of The Two Towers. Before casting finished, rumours circulated that Jackson had considered Bean for the role of Aragorn, but neither Bean nor Jackson confirmed this in subsequent interviews. Bean's well-known fear of flying, with helicopters, caused him difficulties in mountainous New Zealand, where the trilogy was filmed. After a particularly rough ride, he vowed not to fly to a location again. In one instance, he chose to take a ski lift into the mountains and then hike the final few miles, in full costume complete with shield, armour and sword.

Bean has a tattoo of the English word "nine" written using Tengwar on his shoulder, a reference to his involvement in the Lord of the Rings and the fact that his character was one of the original nine companions of the Fellowship of the Ring. The other actors of "The Fellowship"—Elijah Wood, Sean Astin, Orlando Bloom, Billy Boyd, Ian McKellen, Dominic Monaghan and Viggo Mortensen—acquired the same tattoo. John Rhys-Davies, whose character was Gimli, also one of the original nine companions, arranged for his stunt double to get the tattoo.