Viggo Mortensen approached for Lord of the Rings return in The Hunt For Gollum

Viggo Mortensen has been approached for 'The Lord of the Rings: The Hunt For Gollum'.

The 66-year-old actor starred as Aragorn in the iconic film adaptations of J.R.R Tolkien's fantasy epics in the early 2000s, and the character is expected to play a key role in the upcoming live action film directed by Andy Serkis.

Writer Philippa Boyens - who is working on the movie with Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh - told The Playlist: "The Hunt for Gollum’ is set during ‘The Fellowship of the Ring’ era, shortly before Frodo Baggins leaves the Shire for Rivendell.

"And it begins with Gandalf sending Aragorn on a quest to find Gollum, who the wizard fears may reveal information about the One Ring to Sauron, so Viggo Mortensen’s appearance is crucial. But will he return?

“Honestly, that’s entirely going to be up to Viggo, collaboratively and we are at a very early stage.

"I’ve spoken to Viggo, Andy [Serkis] has spoken to him, Peter [Jackson] has spoken to him, we’ve all spoken to each other and honestly, I cannot imagine anyone else playing Aragorn, but it will be completely and entirely up to Viggo.”

She insisted bringing Viggo back as Aragorn would be "about a digital makeup" rather than using artificial intelligence (AI), and him reprising his role will "entirely" depend on the script.

Boyens admitted: "And he doesn’t have a script yet.

"So to be fair to Viggo, let’s see if we write a good enough role and that he can find enough in it to see that it’s a performance he wants to take on.

"After that, it’ll be between Viggo and Andy of how that is achieved.”

She insisted that regardless of whether or not Viggo plays the character again, the 'brain trust' leading the film would "still want him to be heavily involved" in the process as a whole.

She added: "I suspect if he decides he doesn’t want to do it we would still want him to be heavily involved, like how do we hand this character off.

“But literally that decision is several, several months away.

"He’s got to read the script first and that’s exactly what I’m going to be working on when I get out of this interview [laughs].”

Over the summer, Viggo himself addressed the possibility of a comeback and insisted any decision will be made with Aragorn himself in mind.

He told GQ UK magazine: "I don’t know exactly what the story is, I haven’t heard. Maybe I’ll hear about it eventually.

"I like playing that character. I learned a lot playing the character. I enjoyed it a lot.

"I would only do it if I was right for it in terms of, you know, the age I am now and so forth. I would only do it if I was right for the character. It would be silly to do it otherwise.”