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Motion-capture performances have never gotten serious awards consideration. Do you think that’s about to change?

I hope it’s going to change. I’ve been using this technology for 17 years (since he first played Gollum in 2001’s The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring) and there has been a lot of misunderstanding about what it is.

In some ways, it’s not considered acting and it absolutely is. There’s no question about it. I never draw a distinction between playing a live-action character and a motion-capture role.

There’s nothing different. You do the exact same process of building the character, working on the physicality, dealing with the emotion of the character; you go on set and film with your fellow actors and the director. People have a hard time understanding that. They’d have an easier time understanding it if I was wearing layers of prosthetic makeup like John Hurt in the Elephant Man or Charles Laughton in The Hunchback of Notre Dame or Gary Oldman playing Winston Churchill (in Darkest Hour). But the idea of doing something digitally is something people find hard to grasp.

The authorship of the role lies completely with the actors in these films. But I do feel that there’s been a big sea change this year especially with (War for the Planet of the Apes) and there seems to be more awareness that (motion-capture performances) is acting.

When you first started out 17 years ago playing Gollum in the Lord of the Rings, did you envision all this?