LA Daily
News
Camping Fans
January 14, 2001
'Rings' Buzz Starts
Months Before December Release
Jennifer Hamm
BURBANK -- After driving 215 miles from the Yosemite Valley, David Schulze stood 12 hours in the pouring rain outside the AMC Theaters before rushing inside Friday to grab a prime seat -- not for the premiere of a star-studded epic movie, but the one-minute, 46-second preview for one.
He and about 20 other hard-core fans of J.R.R. Tolkien's "Lord of the Rings" withstood rain and bone-chilling cold in order to see the trailer for the movie version of the classic fantasy trilogy, scheduled for release Dec. 19.
"Waiting overnight was nothing," said Schulze, a 45-year-old construction worker who first entered Tolkien's world of hobbits and wizards as a teen-ager. "I've been waiting since 1973."
Schulze and the other fans gathered in front of the AMC theaters on Palm Avenue well before midnight Thursday. They erected a makeshift tent to keep dry, then roasted marshmallows and posted live updates of their escapade on the Internet.