“Tenzing” means: Tom Hiddleston reveals the challenges of filming in Everest

O new Apple TV+ film “Tenzing”, which tells the story the first time an expedition managed to reach the summit of Everest, gave Tom Hiddleston “the experience of a lifetime,” said the actor at a launch conference in Los Angeles.

“ I have never had an experience like this before and probably never will again,” Hiddleston said, who learned to climb on ice and had to get used to the altitude to body the New Zealander Ed Hillary.

“Having the honor and privilege of being in these mountains is experiencing the power and majesty of nature, which are eternal,” he said. “To be in the Himalayas is to be reminded that human life is very short and small.”.

The film by Jennifer Peedom debuts on Apple TV+ Portugal on Friday, October 16, and focuses on the life of Nepali Tenzing Norgay, who with Ed Hillary succeeded in completing the first climb of Everest in May 1953. The director wanted to focus on the indigenous people of the region instead of looking at what was done by the western lens and rejected the use of studios and artificial scenarios.

“ It was very important to film in the landscapes where the story takes place”, explained Jennifer Peedom, who worked as a camera operator on expeditions to Everest in her youth. “I wanted the audience and the actors to share this experience that I had, and the dazzle that one has to be in these places.”.

Producer Liz Watts, who spoke at a round table where Lusa participated, explained that many scenes were filmed between Nepal and Tibet. But filming even in Everest was impossible, due to the altitude and the physical and logistical challenges that lie more than 8,800 meters high.

The team chose New Zealand and surrounded themselves with a group of Sherpas – natives of Nepal who live in the Himalayas – with experience climbing the highest mountain in the world. “We were safe, but we weren’t always comfortable,” Jennifer Peedom described.

The actor Willem Dafoe, who plays the leader of the expedition Colonel John Hunt, stressed the physical effort it took to tell the story. “We prepared our equipment and were taken by helicopter,” he said. “We brought a sandwich and something to drink and inevitably the sandwich was frozen like a stone.”.

For Tom Hiddleston, it was a revealing experience about his body and what he could handle. “We didn’t even go to the death zone,” he said, referring to the area above eight thousand meters where atmospheric pressure is so low and oxygen so thin that cells die faster than the rate of reproduction.

“ But what I noticed, and would make me hesitate to rise to this altitude, was the cold and dry of the fingers and feet ", indicated. “If I were on top, I would suffer frostbite.”.

Genden Phuntsok, a Tibetan actor who incarnated Tenzing, did not have so much trouble setting up because it comes from an altitude zone. What you had to do was learn to speak the dialect of the Sherpas.

“ Sometimes we will conquer the mountain or conquer nature and it is impossible”, said the actor, who participated in the conference remotely. “We must respect it,” he continued, stressing the need to keep nature clean, at a time when the growing expeditions leave garbage behind.

“ We should not think that this is ours and serves for our greed ", considered. “We don’t even have to spend money, it’s a free luxury.”.

The British expedition of 1953 was successful after several failed attempts, with more than a dozen dead. Neither Ed Hillary nor Tenzing Norgay had been chosen to try to reach the summit, but they succeeded – and never revealed to the world who came first. “The families asked us to film them walking together,” Liz Watts said.

“Tenzing” is Jennifer Peedom’s first feature film, after Australian filmmakers made the documentaries “Xerpa”, in 2015, and “Mountain”, in 2017, with the narration of Willem Dafoe.