Covid-19 coronavirus: Lord of the Rings actress stuck in New Zealand praises Jacinda Ardern's handling of pandemic

A 'Lord of the Rings' actress who has been stuck in New Zealand ever since lockdown started in March has praised Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern's handling of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Welsh actress Morfydd Clark has been in the country filming the billion-dollar-budget television series since October, in which she plays the powerful elf Galadriel, alongside Gandalf, Frodo and Gollum.

However, she along with hundreds of cast and crew for the Amazon series reportedly had to halt work on the production's west Auckland location in mid-March due to the Covid-19 outbreak.

Speaking to the 'Daily Mail', Clark revealed that she was meant to be back in Britain while the show was on a planned hiatus.

"But not now. I've been calibrating in my head that I won't be home ... for a while," she told the publication.

Even though the actress is desperate to return home, she praised Ardern's efforts on handling the Covid-19 crisis.

"[The county] went into lockdown so quickly ... which has been quite effective," she said.

Welsh actress Morfydd Clark has been in the country filming Lord of the Rings since October. Photo / Getty Images

Clark is hoping she would return to her south London flat in spring (London's autumn) and plans to see her family in Cardiff afterwards.

The trip may also coincide with the cinema release of Rose Glass's film 'Saint Maud', in which Clark plays a troubled nurse.

The Welsh actress said that working on the Amazon Studios adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings has been an "extraordinary experience".

"Every day your jaw drops on the floor again," she said of the amazing scenes she and the cast have been preparing with director JA Bayona.

"His imagination is just wild!"

Now that restrictions have been lifted in New Zealand, people have been encouraged to travel around the country, which Clark said her friends and family branded the country " Wales on steroids".

The actress also revealed the BBC movie 'The Souvenir', starring Honor Swinton Byrne and her mother, Tilda Swinton, was her favourite film during lockdown.

Morfydd Clark plays Mina in the well-received new Netflix/BBC version of 'Dracula' and played Sister Clara in the new adaptation of Phillip Pullman's 'His Dark Materials'.

She also stars in 'The Personal History of David Copperfield', the latest film from 'In The Loop' creator Armando Iannucci, in which she played both David's mother Clara and his first love, Dora Spenlow.

"My first day on the film I didn't have any lines and just had to scream while pretending to give birth," she recalled.

"So I screamed. Then I looked up and there were Tilda and Dev [Patel, who plays David as a grown-up], looking down at me."