Mark Interviews 2000+

Star Warrior: Using the Force, Mark Hamill outlines his days as Luke Skywalker

Mark Hamill is an odd, but happy bundle of contradictions. He wants the world to know he has a full life apart from his involvement in the STAR WARS trilogy, but he cannot escape, for more than a few moments, his alter-ego, Luke Skywalker.

Hamill still finds it difficult to think of himself as a genuine movie star. "I've been offered some really amazing deals, and when I hear the offers, it's like, 'Excuse me, I have to sit down now and splash cold water on my face. Can you hold the line?' Then I come back and say, 'Now, can you repeat that number?' The only trouble is that most of the scripts that I've been sent [throughout my career] have been terrible. I remember one in particular was about a pioneer boy who was instrumental in saving a covered wagoo. He had a pet mountain lion with whom he wacked down Indians, and to whom he would say thinks like, 'Golly Bucky, the followed us!' It was like Luke Skywalker meets the Indians!"

For his follow-up to STAR WARS, he chose a completely different kind of picture, Corvette Summer, a romantic comedy-adventure in which he played a lonely, young man obsessed with a prized automobile. His third feature, the World War II action epic The Big Red One, in which he co-starred with Lee Marvin, enabled him to stretch his talents in yet another direction.

Despite his success, Hamill seems to have made a conscious effort to not allow his ego to become inflicted [??] because, in his opinion, he was simply in the right place at the right time. "I lucked into STAR WARS,"he says. "I know there were hundreds of other actors being considered for Luke Skywalker in New York, San Francisco and London. Does that make me think I'm the best actor who auditioned for the role? Of course not - I'm just the best version. George Lucas didn't know who I was, and he couldn't have cared less. He never even asked me how old I was. I was 24 when I made STAR WARS, and Luke was supposed to be 20. Maybe if he knew I was that old, he wouldn't have chosen me."

As to how well he did in the part, "I think I really hit it,"Hamill says. "During the shooting, I was becoming upset that I might be overshadowed by all the special FX, and I know that Harrison and Carrie Fisher were concerned about the same thing. Fortunately, Alec Guinness said to me, 'Look, you're the juvenile lead. In every kind of fantasy picture there has to be an anchor in reality, to contrast with all the bizarre elements. If you didn't fit in, the audience would say the effects were terrific, but it was too bad the story and the characters didn't work out.'"

Hamill's fan fervor is authentic because like millions of other kids, he grew up loving science fiction and horror films and Marvel and DC comics; he was also a faithful reader of Famous Monsters of Filmland. STAR WARS gave Hamill the chance to star in the kind of fantasy adventure he loved as a kid, and although critics and people in the movie industry have overlooked how hard he had to work to make Luke Skywalker come alive with all his mechanical and monstrous co-stars, it no longer bothers him. As he sits in his hotel room, Hamill is buoyantly content. He has also subscribed to Starlogfor years, and reads it as soon as it reaches his mailbox.

"What I want to know from you,"he says good-naturedly, "is how you could say in your Harrison Ford interview that Han Solo became the dominant figure in The Empire Strikes Back! Did you know I did that whole Dagobah scene without human actors?"

"I'm only kidding,"he quickly adds. "At first I was disappointed that I didn't get praise for the sequence, but on second thought, the fact that no one mentioned it seems to be the greatest compliment of all. You know the old dictum: The best special effects are the ones no one notices. Imagine if someone had said or written, 'He's talking to a manipulated piece of rubber,' or something. But no one did, and that means they totally believed what was being presented, which was very hard work for me. Yoda gave me no lines while we were shooting, and that was only part of the hardship,"Hamill points out. "When we were at screenings of the film, people asked me where Yoda was. He was accepted by many as a real being."

"Of course I had the same problem with dialogue when I worked with C-3PO and R2-D2. I could hear muffled dialogue from Threepio, but never anything from R2-D2. Actually, in Empire, he's mostly a robot - more so than in STAR WARS. Only when he waddles is Kenny [Baker] inside. In fact, Kenny got nervous about them perfecting so completely that he would be out of a job. I told him not to worry; he does not understand that it is wonderful for people to read that credit and have the continuity of 'Kenny Baker as R2-D2'."

Hamill expresses more ambivalence about the making of Empire. "It was a physical ordeal the whole time,"he recalls, "but I didn't really mind that. The sword fight at the end took eight weeks to film, for instance. I would have liked to have done all the stunts myself. I did every one of my own stunts in Empire but the fall through the window. The insurance company said no."

"During the fight with Darth Vader, inching out a long a nine-inch ledge, 40 feet above the floor, with all those wind machines going, I fell one time. But I was able to tuck and roll like I was taught. I did all my own stunts in Return of the Jedi, and I did all my own stunts in STAR WARS. I was later made a member of the British Stunt Union - not just a belt buckle, a full membership. I was very proud of that, because it isn't lightly given."

Hamill is asked about the truth of one of the more bizarre rumors concerning the making of Empire: Did Frank Oz really spring Miss Piggy on Luke in the mists of Dagobah? "He sure did,"says Hamill, smiling at the memory. "It was a joke I had asked Frank to do when I first met him. But I wasn't expecting it when it happened, or I would have asked that the video cameras be put on. As it turned out, there is no film or tape of it at all."

"Between the time I first mentioned it and the day it happened, there had been a strike, and Frank hadn't had easy access to Miss Piggy. But that day he asked me if I would help him off camera for a while, and I thought, 'He doesn't really need me.' So I had a suspicion. It came on the line, 'Adventure, excitement. A Jedi craves not these things. Follow your feelings.' Anyway, he had a black velvet bag over his arm, and Miss Piggy popped up in her lavender gown and jewelry, clashing with the set's drabness."

A diabolical mimic, Hamill easily breaks into a perfect imitation of Miss Piggy: "Feelings? You want feelings? I'll give you feelings! Get behind this couch and I'll show you feelings, punk. What is this bole? I've been booked into dumps before, but never like this. Get me my agent on the phone!"

Hamill was glad to return to Empire and to Jedi and reunite with Ford and Fisher. In truth, he was happy to still be alive after an auto accident gave him a new perspective on life. "One night over dinner, I asked George what he would have done if I had been killed in the car accident, instead of just breaking my nose. Would somebody else have finished my part? He said, 'No.' There would have been a script change that would have found a long-lost brother or sister, something genetic, so that the Force would be with them."

This turn in the conversation starts Hamill thinking about the accident, which still haunts him. "I had the accident way before STAR WARS came out, but what really happened has been terribly distorted. I broke my nose, that's it! But I've read accounts about how my face has been reconstructed with plastic surgery and how I was pulling myself along the highway with one arm looking for help. I even heard that I drove off a cliff! That was the best one of all,"he laughs.

"To set the record straight. It was about 6 p.m. I had a brand-new BMW and I was playing the 1812 Overture on the sound system. It had terrific sound. Also, in a car like that, you can lose track of how fast you're going - I had always driven klunky cars. Then, suddenly, I realized I was on the wrong freeway, and that it might take me an hour and 45 minutes to find my way back. It was a split-second decision. I saw my exit ramp three lanes over and I thought I could make it, so I turned the wheel sharply. Well, I was going about 70 and the car flipped. I broke my nose and that was all."

Luke Skywalker's history shifted through all three films: first he learned that he was a Jedi Knight-to-be... then that his father lived... and then that not only was there another who held the Force (before Jedi, Hamill remarked: "Somebody suggested it might be the Princess, but I think that would be a letdown."), but he had a twin sister. The actor, of course, began the trilogy knowing none of these family secrets.

"At the time STAR WARS was being filmed, I had no idea Darth Vader was my father,"Hamill recalls. "I don't think Alec Guinness did, either, but in the scene where I ask him who my father was, he hesitated. I don't know how George made him do that. I didn't hear George saying, 'Maybe you don't really really want to tell him.'"

"But it's tricky. I remember very early on asking who my parents were and being told that my father and Obi-Wan met Vader on the edge of a volcano and they had a duel. My father and Darth Vader fell into the crater, and my father was instantly killed. Vader crawled out horribly scarred, and at that point the Emperor landed and Obi-Wan ran into the forest, never to be seen again."

As for Luke Skywalker, he originated and evolved from Lucas' earliest conceptions of his male protagonist. "Way back in the early days,"Hamill says, "I saw some pre-production sketches and was amazed. My character was cowering behind the Princess. Originally, she was the lead character, trying to save her brother, who was on the Death Star. Then George reversed the roles. And on another occasion, I was at the office and saw an earlier draft of the screenplay than the one I got in 1976. For a while, the Obi-Wan and Han Solo characters were the same person. They split the difference and the age came to about 45."

Surprisingly, Hamill admits that he backed into the starring role of Luke Skywalker. "I had heard that George was going to make a SF film,"Hamill remembers, "and I asked this other actor who had tried out for a part what it was all about. He thought it was something like Flash Gordon, and I figured they'd get somebody like Nick Nolte to play the part. I knew this kind of space-age heroes always had a teenage companion named Bucky, but I never really thought of there being a role for me. I just asked my agent if she could arrange for me to go on the set and see some of it being shot, because there was supposed to be a lot of special FX."

But as things worked out, the script kept evolving and Hamill found himself in the middle of it. "And how would I not love every minute of it?"he asks. "It's a great role - perfect for kids. But that's not to say they should all go out and fight each other with sticks. I also love the construction. I mean, in the beginning, it's such a clear-cut situation. Darth Vader is so spooky, but kids can identify with the two robots who are just as scared as they are. And kids know it's not real; they're smarter than people imagine."

STAR WARS has expanded into a multi-media franchise, including original comics (published by Marvel, and later Dark Horse) and original hardcover and paperback novels (published by Del Rey, Bantamand Berkley). There was also the radio adaptation created for National Public Radio. "The 13 half-hour STAR WARS radio shows not only tell all that was in the film, but additional stuff, too - the stuff cut from the film. Like when the Princess goes to Alderaan and you meet her father,"Hamill explains. "I did it with Tony Daniels [repeating his C-3PO role], but Harrison was working on Raiders of the Lost Ark, so Perry King plays Han Solo and it's a totally different interpretation. Carrie [Fisher] didn't want to do it, so Annie Sachs plays the Princess."Brock Peters voices Darth Vader.

The NPRadaptation of Empire once again starred Hamill, Daniels, King, Sachs and Peters, while adding John Lithgow as Yoda and Billy Dee Williams as Lando Calrissian. However, it wasn't until 1996 that NPRfinally taped a radio version of Jedi. Daniel, King, Sachs, Peters and Lithgow encored, but Williams (replaced by Arye Gross) and Hamill (succeeded by Josh Farndon) were not part of that ensemble.

Doing the STAR WARS radio show "wasn't a money thing, but it was great -- my first time with radio drama and probably the first time many kids heard drama that called on them to use their imagination. Another pleasure was that I could say my lines and not have to wait 18 months for the visuals to be done."

As for Return of the Jedi, it presented some problems for the actor. Given the six-year build-up and the need to wrap up numerous dangling plot threads, Jedi faced a formidable challenge. "I know there are people who were disappointed,"admits Hamill. "With everything that had been set up, you couldn't bring the trilogy to a conclusion without disappointing some people."

"The trilogy is structured as a fairy tale set to a classical three act play. STAR WARS was act one. It introduced the characters. The Empire Strikes Back was act two. It developed the characters and gave them problems, with tragic overtones. Jedi is act three. It's the big finish, and everything is brought to an end."

"I love the film,"he emphasizes. "I think it's the best of the three. But that's also how I felt about Empire [when I saw it]. Jedi is even more satisfying, because it's like finally hearing the other shoe drop. It's the punchline that had been coming for six years."

"I'm often taken aback by the intensity with which some people relate to the STAR WARS saga. These pictures are only meant to be diverting entertainment. They shouldn't have any more weight than a really good Looney Tunes cartoon. When you get right down to it, Return of the Jedi is only a movie - it's not the tablet from the mountain. For the most part, I'm very pleased with this finale."

While awaiting the Jedi script, Hamill took advantage of an invitation to meet with director Richard Marquand. "I liked him from the start,"he declares. "We discussed everything, from what we thought was going to happen to what we wanted to see happen. He was very enthusiastic and delighted at the prospect of making the movie. His energy matched my own enthusiasm for finishing the trilogy. I was also heartened by the fact that he had been an actor, so he knew the kinds of problems we would encounter on a film of this nature. He was able to communicate in a way that was very helpful."

Although Marquand actively sollicited contributions, Hamill was determined to remain discreet about offering suggestions. "I didn't want to perform major surgery,"he insists. "It was all fine-tuning. You see what the scene has to accomplish, and then it's your job to do it in a way that's comfortable for you and everyone else. There were certain choices that I actually wanted to have explained to me. But it was really George's baby, and he and his people were very conscientious in staying true to his basic concept."

To his relief, Hamill found that he enjoyed the production of Jedi far more than the making of Empire. "I knew going in that this film was the last one, so I didn't take it for granted."he remarks. "On the other hand, Empire seemed like nine months of torture to me. I really got the stuffing kicked out of me on that movie. I'm supposed to be an actor, not a stuntman. And, because of the mechanical problems with Yoda, I was the only human being listed on the call sheet for months. Everything else was puppets, props and special FX."

Among Hamill's greatest challenges on the Jedi shoot were the sequences which required him to act backward. "You must think out the shot in advance and perform it in reverse, so that when it's projected, you get the opposite effect,"he explains. "For instance, there were scenes where my lightsaber had to jump into my hand. To accomplish that action, I had to enter the shot as though I was exiting it, with my final mood intact. Then, I had to make an abrupt move into calmness, put my hand up and throw my sword away. It was very difficult to coordinate. I had to go over to a corner, close my eyes and think for a moment, because it didn't come naturally. It was very much like mime."

Once again, Hamill was presented with the problem of acting opposite special FX that weren't always there, most notably in the scene involving the Rancor, a creature who didn't fully show up on screen until post-production. "In shooting that sequence, one of my biggest acting dreams came true. I actually got to be held in a giant rubber hand,"he laughs. "I was on a rostrum, and was held up by a crane. They fitted the claws around my middle, and then I pushed off from the rostrum. It was all controlled, but after what I went through on Empire - hanging 60 feet above the floor with mattresses below me and wind machines blowing - nothing could faze me."

More dangerous for the young actor were his fight scenes with Darth Vader, in the course of which he worked with five different stuntmen - none of whom was David Prowse. "Bob Anderson was the man who actually did Vader's fighting,"Hamill reveals. "It was always supposed to be a secret, but I finally told George I didn't think it was fair anymore. Bob worked so bloody hard that he deserved some recognition. It's ridiculous to try to preserve the myth that it was all done by one man."

Starlog - 25 Years of Sci-Fi Movies, July 2002