It's a voice now familiar to millions - the infamous character of Gollum brought to vivid life by actor Andy Serkis.

Celebrating 75 years of The Hobbit, fans made the unexpected journey to Fulham Palace Gardens in south west London, which was transformed into the Shire for the day.

Billed as a 'The Hobbit Second Breakfast', Serkis got back into character to read extracts from JRR Tolkien's classic book.

The upcoming movie of The Hobbit comes 12 years after Serkis first brought Gollum to life in the Lord of the Rings trilogy.

He explained how he reconnected with his character after so long.

(SOUNDBITE) (English) ACTOR, ANDY SERKIS, SAYING:

"After the Lord of the Rings he was kind of absorbed into the public consciousness in quite a big way and part of the difficulty of doing the Hobbit 12 years later was kind of reclaiming him because I have heard that many impersonations and people ask me to do that many telephone messages for them...so the first days of doing the character again I really had to...it all sounded right it's just really connecting with him again."

The first part of director Peter Jackson's of The Hobbit is released this Christmas.