Similarities between Magic Tavern and Lord of the Rings

During my recent deep dive into the books of J.R.R. Tolkien, I was reminded of parallels between his works and the improvised fantasy podcast, “Hello from the Magic Tavern.”

In the Silmarillion, Tolkien explains the wizards are known by many names.

“In the likeness of Men they appeared, old but vigorous, and they changed little with the years, and aged but slowly, though great cares lay on them; great wisdom they had, and many powers of mind and hand.

Long they journeyed far and wide among Elves and Men, and held converse also with beasts and with birds; and the peoples of Middle-earth gave to them many names, for their true names they did not reveal.

Chief among them were those whom the Elves called Mithrandir and Curunir, but Men in the North named Gandalf and Saruman.” (The Silmarillion, Of the Rings of Power and the Third Age)

Usidore, one of the co-hosts of Hello from the Magic Tavern, is a wizard who enthusiastically lists his various names at least once an episode.

 

“I am Usidore,

Wizard of the 12th Realm of Ephysiyies,

Master of Light and Shadow,

Manipulator of Magical Delights,

Devourer of Chaos,

Champion of the Great Halls of Terr'akkas.

The elves know me as Fi’ang Yalok.

The dwarves know me as Zoenen Hoogstandjes.

And I am also known in the Northeast as Gaismunēnas Meistar.”

 

Matt Young, the actor who plays Usidore, explained the backstory of Usidore’s various names during an episode of Behind the Tavern, a series available to paid subscribers on Stitcher Premium.

 

“I remember very clearly sitting at my desk and writing out the Usidore name the night before we were recording. I was putting words into Google Translate and bastardizing them to come up with the weird elvish and dwarvish names, but I couldn’t come up with a good name.

I didn’t have Usidore. I had all the other stuff mostly worked out. The next day at work I found a wizard name generator online, or it might have been a DND name generator. I just pushed the button a bunch of times and I was like, Usidore, I like that.” (Behind the Tavern, Season 1, Ep. 1) 

 

Matt anticipated he would provide his full list of names one time.

He expected to reference his secondary names only when he met a character that would know him by one of those names.

But when Matt recorded the first episode of Magic Tavern, one of his cohosts, Arnie Niekamp, who plays a fictionalized version of himself, asked Usidore to repeat his full name.

At that point, Matt realized he would say Usidore’s full name over and over as an recurring joke.

Matt, Arnie, and Adal Rifai discussed Usidore’s many names during the 2018 Chicago Comic and Entertainment Expo. That discussion begins 8 minutes and 25 seconds into the video of their panel discussion.

Sam the improviser

A passage from The Fellowship of the Ring also made me think of Hello from the Magic Tavern.

Sam improvised and sang a song about a troll as he rested with his fellow travelers.

 

“'Where did you come by that, Sam?' asked Pippin. 'I've never heard those words before.'

Sam muttered something inaudible.

'It's out of his own head, of course,' said Frodo. 'I am learning a lot about Sam Gamgee on this journey. First he was a conspirator, now he's a jester. He'll end up by becoming a wizard — or a warrior!'

'I hope not,' said Sam. 'I don't want to be neither!'” (The Fellowship, Book One, Chapter 12)

 

Hello from the Magic Tavern is a weekly podcast where improvisers spontaneously create an entire magical world.

The Lord of the Rings is a series of books that feature a meticulously planned fantasy world that was created by J.R.R. Tolkien over many years.

That series features a fictional character, Sam, who improvised a story on the spot, as the creators of Magic Tavern do every week.

 

Shout-out

In September, I received a shout-out on Hello from the Magic Tavern.

I tagged several of the show’s creators on Twitter with links to my blog posts about the show and my posts about The Lord of the Rings.

The Mysterious Man, played by Tim Sniffen, concludes episodes with sarcastic remarks about Magic Tavern actors as he reads the credits. 

In September, the Mysterious Man, one of the characters who introduces Magic Tavern episodes, mentioned me in his introduction to that week’s show. 

 

“People of Earth… You know, hearing myself say that, I tend to address you as one big easily-misled group.

But the truth is I can see each one of you.

Why don’t we take a moment for a few shout-outs?

Jason, those are some beautiful painted figurines behind you. But we both know that’s not a Saurmon maquette. It’s Gandalf and you somehow filed down the hat, and the lie is killing you.” (Magic Tavern, Season 3, Ep. 57 — Together). 

A maquette is a small, preliminary model used by a sculptor before creating a full-sized work of art.

I am fairly certain the reference was made in response to my tweets about Magic Tavern and The Lord of the Rings.

For the record, I don’t own any Lord of the Rings figurines, nor have I made any Lord of the Rings art.

But I do appreciate the shout-out from one of my favorite podcasts.