Stephen Colbert joins the new Lord of the Rings: But what will he do?

Comedian Stephen Colbert has an exciting new job. The American late-night show host will be co-writing a new film in the legendary Lord of the Rings franchise.

He was announced as a writer after his 11-year stint on The Late Show is set to come to an end in May. On Tuesday (March 25), the announcement was made by Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson, who revealed Colbert’s entry into the project. Colbert will write the new film alongside Philippa Boyens and Peter McGee.

In a video shared on the official handle of Warner Bros., the director gave an update on Andy Serkis’ The Hunt for Gollum.

“Andy is doing a terrific job. It’s looking amazing. The script is coming together really well and I think it’s going to be a really good film,” the director says in the video.

Then the director went on to share that a very special partner, who has joined the next Lord of the Rings film, titled, Shadows of the Past.

Colbert appeared alongside the director in the video call, explaining that the plot of the next movie will draw from chapters of The Fellowship of the Ring.

“You know what the books mean to me, and what your films mean to me,” Colbert told Jackson. “But the thing I found myself reading over and over again were the six chapters early on in [‘The Fellowship of the Ring’] that ya’ll never developed into the first movie back in the day,'' he said.

''It’s basically the chapter ‘Three Is Company’ [Chapter III] through ‘Fog on the Barrow-Downs’ [Chapter VIII]. And I thought, ‘Oh, wait, maybe that could be its own story that could fit into the larger story. Could we make something that was completely faithful to the books while also being completely faithful to the movies that you guys had already made?''

Colbert will work with Jackson, Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens.

According to the official logline, the film will take place fourteen years after the passing of Frodo and Sam, Merry and Pippin set out to retrace the first steps of their adventure. Meanwhile, Sam’s daughter, Elanor, has discovered a long-buried secret and is determined to uncover why the War of the Ring was very nearly lost before it even began.”

This is not the first time Colbert has collaborated with Jackson. He has also worked on 2013’s “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. But it was a small contribution.

Meanwhile, the world is waiting for The Lord of the Rings spinoff The Hunt for Gollum, which is a prequel to Peter Jackson's trilogy and is based on the appendices written by J. R. R. Tolkien for the books.

The movie is scheduled to release on December 17, 2027.