Elijah Wood

Roger Ebert once wrote that Wood had 'emerged, I believe, as the most talented actor, in his age group, in Hollywood history' - and Wood was about thirteen at the time. He'd been working since age eight, with credits in The Good Son and The Ice Storm before anyone thought about hobbits. The audition tape that changed everything was self-directed, with Wood dressed as Frodo, competing against 150 other actors. Three films later, carrying a franchise that grossed nearly $3 billion worldwide, nobody was calling him a child actor anymore.

SpectreVision, the production company Wood co-founded in 2010, isn't playing small: its horror film Rabbit Trap with Dev Patel premiered at Sundance, and in 2024 it launched a podcast network with filmmakers Mike Flanagan and David Lowery. Wood himself plays an eccentric citizen detective in Yellowjackets, which is the kind of specifically odd role that aligns with everything SpectreVision backs. He's built his post-LOTR career around genre credibility instead of franchise returns.

He DJs internationally under the name Wooden Wisdom with musician Zach Cowie, and this isn't a celebrity side project. It's been a consistent part of his life for well over a decade. He runs Simian Records as an actual label operation. His musical taste is specific: he's called Prince's Sign O' The Times his all-time favorite and will talk about records long after you've run out of follow-up questions. The Frodo stuff is useful for name recognition. It's just not who he is.