There’s no denying that The Lord Of The Rings franchise is huge. The books, films, spin-offs, and games have all turned the series into an absolute titan in the fantasy genre, with an army of dedicated fans cosplaying, creating their own adaptations of the series and much more.

The original film trilogy heavily contributed to its success, and it’s safe to say that all the tremendous actors involved in its production were well-rewarded for their performances, except Orlando Bloom. Orlando Bloom played the elf-archer Legolas in all three The Lord Of The Rings films, even going on to reprise his character for two of The Hobbit films as well. At the time of the original trilogy, Bloom was an unknown actor, with Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, being his first big-break in the film industry.

While the success of the series did wonders for his acting career, the same can’t be said for his wallet, as he recently revealed in an interview with Howard Stern that he received a cheque of $175,000 for all three films. While that’s still an extraordinary amount of money by ordinary standards, it’s pretty measly considering all three films made a total of $2.9 billion in the box-office.

Luckily, Bloom didn’t let the paycheck get to him, saying that in the end, the opportunities his performance created were far greater than the money earned. He said: “Listen, greatest gift of my life…You’d do it again for half the money.” A lovely sentiment, and it’s nice to see he still has so much love for the franchise that launched him into a long and fulfilling acting career.

The success of The Lord of the Rings is also still going, with the Prime Video spin-off series The Rings of Power doing reasonably well despite some less-than-ideal reviews. The world of Middle-earth will also be returning to the big screen in the future, as Warner Bros announced a new set of films is currently in development, though details on what they’ll be are few and far between at the moment.