Parks and Rec's Nick Offerman Auditioned for the Role of Gimli in LOTR

Character actor Nick Offerman is probably best known for playing Ron Swanson in Parks and Recreation, and during some promo work for his other show Good Omens, he revealed that he actually auditioned to play everyone's favorite dwarf in the Lord of the Rings movies.

Talking to BuzzFeed, Offerman got to the topic of himself landing an audition for Lord of the Rings. He says:

"When I heard they were making Lord of the Rings, I wrote dogged letters for a couple of years to [director] Peter Jackson, asking him to audition me to play Samwise Gamgee, After about 18 months, I was awarded an audition for the role of Gimli, the dwarf… and they got some jerk British guy, first-timer…"

Of course, John Rhys Davies, who landed the role of Gimli, was no first-timer. He was a character actor himself like Offerman and has starred in numerous films since the 70s, one of them being the first Indiana Jones movie, Raiders of the Lost Ark. It's very obvious that Offerman was just joking about not landing the role, just in case some people thought this was an attack on Davies.

Though Offerman didn't land anything in LOTR or the following Hobbit trilogy, there are still chances for him to appear in the franchise moving forward. Amazon is working on a Lord of the Rings series, and maybe they can find a role for Offerman. After all, he already has his own star power and he would be a draw for anyone who loves both Parks and Rec and LOTR.

No release date has been set for the Lord of the Rings TV series, but you can catch Offerman in Good Omens which is now on Prime.

See Also: Jon Hamm Is Waiting for His Call to be in Star Wars