It is a bleak time for the
Republic. It is a period of great struggle for the entire planet, and
not only is the dark side winning, it's no longer clear any other side
even exists. Seriously, you guys – Earth is messed up. Just ask a polar
bear, or an almond farmer, or a GOP debate moderator. Or maybe check in
with Luke Skywalker.
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"The world is so horrible," says Mark Hamill, Luke's closest earthly
representative, sitting in the shadow of swaying trees in his rather
pleasant Malibu yard. At 64, Hamill is older than Alec Guinness was in
the first Star Wars, and is in the process of regrowing a
distinctly Obi-Wan-ish beard. "Between the Middle East and gun violence
and global warming and racism, it's just horrible. And people need this. It's therapeutic."
The "this" in question is Star Wars: The Force Awakens, out on December 18th and directed by geek hero J.J. Abrams, fresh from rebooting the Star Trek franchise. It is the seventh Star Wars
movie, and the first not under the control of the saga's gnomic
creator, George Lucas, who let it all go in 2012, selling Lucasfilm and
its franchise to Disney for $4 billion. The Force Awakens will return to the Star Wars galaxy three decades after the events of 1983's Return of the Jedi, launching what Disney intends to be an endless series of movies.
So, for the first time since Ronald Reagan's first term, The Force Awakens
will reunite us with Hamill as Luke, Carrie Fisher as Princess Leia –
and Harrison Ford, incredibly enough, as Han Solo. Hamill's role is a
guarded mystery – rumors suggest the part is small, setting up a more
essential position in the already-in-preproduction sequel. Returning as
well: Chewbacca, with the same guy, seven-foot-plus Peter Mayhew, in the
fur suit; C-3PO, played once more by Anthony Daniels; R2-D2; and even
relative action-figure obscurities such as Admiral Ackbar, best known
for a single line of dialogue ("It's a trap") and his resemblance to
something you'd find at a raw bar.
The film will also introduce us to a panoply of new characters,
creatures and planets. Chief among them are the two stars, Daisy Ridley
and John Boyega, both young British actors. Ridley, a total unknown,
plays the desert-planet scavenger Rey, last name as yet undisclosed. (It
may mean nothing or everything that she resembles Natalie Portman, who
played Luke and Leia's mom in the prequels.) Boyega, memorable as a teen
gang leader in the 2011 cult sci-fi film Attack the Block,
plays erstwhile stormtrooper Finn, last name also unrevealed – but since
Abrams notes that the character was written "without any race in mind,"
online speculation that it's "Calrissian" is likely nonsense. Then
again, Abrams – who has been known to pick obfuscation over spoilers –
claims the same about Rey, which could complicate assumptions that she's
a Skywalker.
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"What's been incredible for me has been the creative freedom," he
continues, "and the desire to make something hopefully worth people's
time – and not a commercial for toys. I'm not itching to be involved in
creating things that end up in a landfill. I wanted to tell a story:
What would happen if you were 19, 20 years old and you found yourself in
a Star Wars universe?"
Lucas had written what Kennedy describes as a "brief synopsis" for
the sequels, but those ideas were treated as a starting point, at best.
Abrams spent eight months or so working on a script with screenwriter
Michael Arndt (of Little Miss Sunshine fame), with occasional
help from Kasdan and Simon Kinberg (of the X-Men franchise). They came
away with essentially nothing. Arndt said he would need 18 more months
to finish – way more time than Disney or Abrams wanted to spend. "Movies
are just like life," says Kasdan, sounding very much like the dude who
wrote Yoda's best lines. "They are infinitely complicated and incredibly
simple. I think that what had eluded the group was finding the simple
spine of the story."
Arndt was out; Kasdan was in. His initial involvement in the saga
began under similar circumstances, when a deadline-haunted George Lucas
asked him to rapidly rework a weak Empire Strikes Back script.
This time, Kasdan and Abrams had nine months to write one of the most
anticipated movies of all time. "You say, 'Are you a professional or
not?'" says Kasdan. For Abrams, having Kasdan aboard removed the
possibility of writing "fan fiction": "I didn't have to ask the question
'What would they have done?' Because he was there."
Abrams grew up on Lucas and Spielberg, and there were moments where
he couldn't suppress his fandom. "When J.J. first encountered 3PO," says
Daniels, "it was like having an enthusiastic schoolboy. It was so good
for my ego – and, of course, for 3PO's – to have that energy and joy,
and to have somebody in front of you who's got the courage to take on
this whole thing."
In the screening room, Abrams is finishing his speech. "The idea that
we're hopefully reigniting the flame of passion toward this thing
George Lucas created, it's very exciting," he says. "It feels like an
honor to me. I'm really grateful for all the work." They applaud, the
lights go down, and a "little reel" from the film begins to play –
though not until a visiting journalist is, tragically, removed from the
room.
Ford spent years downplaying his attachment to Han Solo, his first
starring role after years of scrapping around Hollywood – following two
unsuccessful studio contracts in the Sixties and early Seventies, he had
started a carpentry career to free him from taking parts he didn't
want. A hard-to-source quote floating around online has him claiming to
have "outgrown" Han – but he denies ever saying that. (He did call it a
"pretty thin character for me at this point" in 1997.) "And I don't find
any value exploring what I've said about this character in the past,"
he adds.
He did want Solo dead at the end of Jedi. "I didn't have the
imagination to recognize the future potential for the character," he
says. "I was only going to do three of them, so I wanted to use the
character to supply some bass notes, some gravitas. I thought to
continue to be the wise-cracking cynic was not, perhaps . . ."
He stops himself. "But if they'd done that then, I wouldn't have this
experience, which I think is worthy." (It could be of some dark
significance for Solo's fate that both Hamill and Fisher mention talking
with Rian Johnson, who's directing the next Star Wars movie, but Ford says not a word about future films.)
"My dad had a stormtrooper helmet he would
put on and chase us around the house with. The people on the dark side
were more interesting to me. You can't beat their aesthetic!" —Adam
Driver
Not long ago, Ford ran into Fisher at a production office. "I went up
to hug him," she says, "and he did a line from the new movie – this
one! And I didn't recognize it right away because it was really
organic." Harrison Ford, quoting Star Wars? "Before it's quotable!"
Fisher, born into showbiz royalty as the daughter of Debbie Reynolds
and Eddie Fisher, was practically raised on film sets. She saw instantly
what Ford had. "He was sitting on the set in the bar – what's that bar
called?" She sings a bit of the Cantina jazz. "I thought of Spencer
Tracy, Humphrey Bogart – epic. Focus-pulling. I knew I didn't have that.
And Mark – not in the same way."
Ford likes to talk about the Star Wars saga's "utility" in
fans' lives – which is so unromantic it's almost romantic. "It's all
I've ever thought about, being useful," Ford says, unleashing the eye
contact one last time. "On the set, in the work I do with Conservation
International. And in an airplane, it becomes even more simple and
compelling. 'What is the task at hand, right this minute?'" He takes a
breath – his timing is always perfect. "Even when the engine quits."
Ridley, who has a posh West London accent – her father is a photographer who shot the Beatles' first U.S. tour for NME;
her mom works for a bank – enjoys the idea of becoming a hero to little
girls. Especially, she says, because Rey isn't royalty like Princess
Leia and Queen Amidala. "Rey isn't born into privilege," she says. "My
cousin's daughter said something about wanting me to be another
princess, and I'm like, 'No!' Girls don't have to be princesses! They
can be, you know, scavengers!"
She understands that she may be Rey for life. "People have asked me
that as though it's a bad thing. I'm like, 'No, I'm cool with
that.' Everyone's gonna be remembered for one thing. Daniel Radcliffe is
gonna be remembered for Harry Potter, even though he's proved himself
time and time again in other roles."
Boyega isn't worried about getting stuck in the Star Wars universe. He already has other roles coming up, including a part as a Mark Zuckerberg-type CEO in The Circle, with Tom Hanks and Emma Watson. "It's different from the stormtrooper life," he says, offering a leading-man smile.
Driver, meanwhile, was determined to take the role of Kylo Ren as
seriously as anything he's done. As his castmates recall, that sometimes
meant staying in character on set, and even leaving his mask on between
scenes. "Do your thing, man," says Boyega, who is less Method in his
approach. "I mean, for me, I follow what Laurence Olivier or someone
said: 'Just act.' But it was great to see him go for his process. It was
intense."
"Think about it, what it would be to make
three of these movies a million years ago, and now let's do it again,
only you're 40 years older and there's a lot to live up to – or down."
—Carrie Fisher
Hamill lives with Marilou, his wife of more than 30 years, in a
relatively modest house set on a fairy-tale-beautiful property. The
front room is splashed with light, with decor that is more Little House on the Prairie
than Death Star. There are floral couches, blond-wood floors, a
pre-Raphaelite painting of cherub-esque women on a pastoral yard, a bust
of Mozart (Hamill played him in a stage production of Amadeus),
a cabinet filled with decorative plates. On an end table in the corner,
nestled among family photos (the couple have three kids), is a
well-known shot of Hamill in an X-Wing fighter uniform circa 1980,
hugging a pregnant Marilou. Halloween decorations are everywhere –
Hamill is really into Halloween.
Pretty as he was in the original trilogy, Hamill was never fated to
be a movie star. "He couldn't have been," says Fisher, bluntly. "What,
10 people get to be movie stars per generation? But people can still
have substantial careers." It's easier to see why now. Hamill is
charismatic, but charmingly eccentric, more like the president of a Star Wars
fan club than one of its stars. He's thrown on an open short-sleeved
button-down with a USC logo over the T-shirt, and he's wearing black
jeans and Batman-themed Converse sneakers – one of them has green laces,
the other purple. His dirty-blond hair is shaved around the ears for
his villain role on the CW's The Flash.
In the Eighties, Hamill would wonder aloud why he wasn't getting more
film roles. But he's grown comfortable with his eclectic career,
especially after becoming a top voice-over artist, most famously as the
Joker in years of much-loved Batman cartoons. "I got into a niche where I
did voice-overs and I could do theater when I wanted," says Hamill.
"I've been having a great time, doing interesting stuff. It's just that
people don't really pay a lot of attention."
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But he'd need more than his voice to play Luke Skywalker again. So
Hamill, now 64, has spent the past couple of years on what seems to be a
brutal training regimen, this time with Yoda only figuratively on his
back. He seems to have lost a good 50 pounds, but he doesn't want
compliments: "It implies that I looked so dreadful before!" "Look at
what I'm eating now instead of potato chips and bagels," he adds,
gesturing to a fruit-and-vegetable plate. "I'm on the 'if it tastes
good, don't eat it' diet."
Hamill and Fisher were among the first to learn that Lucas was
planning to sell Lucasfilm, and that there would be more movies. (Lucas
actually informed Hamill decades ago that he would be needed as a
sixtysomething Luke, but then told him much later that there would be no
sequels.) Back in 1983, Hamill was sad about the saga ending just as
Luke became a real Jedi: "I had just gotten to be what I wanted to be –
and that's the end of the story?"
But his first reaction to Lucas' news, delivered at a lunch during a Star Wars
convention, was to enter a "state of shock." He realized he had mixed
feelings. "We're all in a great place and we've all done it before," he
says. "There was a beginning, middle and end. You have to think about
all the aspects, 'cause if you wanna maintain a low profile, this isn't
the best way to do it!" He found himself hoping that Ford wouldn't do
it. "I said, 'The ace in the hole is, Harrison's not gonna do this. Why
would he?' So that's our escape clause. You know, if I'm the only one,
I'll look terrible – but if he doesn't do it, I don't have to do it."
On set, it was different. When Hamill walked onto the Millennium Falcon
– and he emphasizes that he did this as himself, not as Luke – he was
overwhelmed. "It was opening up all these little windows in your memory
banks," he says. "How it felt to be sitting in it or just the smell of
it all or where Chewie was playing chess. So you laugh a lot. I mean,
you just can't believe that this is happening. It just doesn't seem
real."
Alone among the original cast, Hamill is a genuine comic-book and
sci-fi super-fan, as well as a Sixties-rock aficionado. "I understand
obsessive-compulsive entertainment interests," he says. "I have many,
many, many of them." In the back corner of his house is an impressive
man cave, filled with nearly as many pop-culture treasures as the Bad
Robot offices: a huge collection of hardcover omnibuses of old DC Comics
issues; vintage Aurora models; Beatles books; a 3D lenticular poster
for the 1954 movie Gorilla at Large; cels from his Batman cartoons; an illuminated 3D Martin and Lewis poster. A treadmill faces the huge TV.
As I head to my car, Hamill sticks his head out from a window, to
say, or rather, yell, goodbye again. I mention that I'm headed to
Fisher's house the next day. "You're gonna have the time of your life,"
he says. "Fasten your seat belt!" Princess Leia has a cold. Or so she
thinks: Later in the week, she will learn she actually has pneumonia. In
any case, Carrie Fisher has decided to do some of her interview while
lying in bed, with a quilt pulled nearly up to her neck. No matter. "I
have a great bedroom," she says, correctly. The upholstered headboard
behind her, set against a pinkish-purple wall, has a stained-glass panel
built into it; it's also brocaded with seashells, a tiny doll hand and
little cards with printed messages ("I know why I was in the hospital,"
one reads). A projector lights up one corner with butterflies; there's a
bird made of tiny lightbulbs in another; a rug displays a colorful
starscape; video art on a flatscreen shows a forest scene.
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She is proprietary about Leia, touting her as a "huge" feminist icon
and bristling at the suggestion that she was ever a "damsel in
distress." "She bossed them around," she says. "I don't know what your
idea of distress is, but that wasn't it! And I wasn't some babe running
through the galaxy with my tits bouncing around. So I wasn't threatening
to women."
She's wearing a black housedress; her feet are bare. Her hair is a
blondish-brown; behind the tinted lenses of her stylish glasses, her
brown eyes are bright, perpetually amused. Her three-year-old French
bulldog, Gary, is by her side, as he was on the Star Wars set:
He was cool with Chewbacca, but traumatized by the sight of a big-eyed
creature played by Simon Pegg. "I don't think J.J. was wild about Gary,"
Fisher says. "He said, 'Explain the dog thing to me.'"
One of the most appealing aspects of the new movie is the idea of
peeking back in on Han and Leia's romance. How close Ford and Fisher got
in real life is a mystery. Fisher has hinted at possibilities that she
may never fully disclose, even in her next book: Brilliantly titled The Princess Diarist,
it's based on journals Fisher recently discovered from the first film.
When Ford found out about it, he joked about needing a lawyer.
The original trio went through a Beatles-like burst of fame together.
But Ford plays down their relationships: "We had separate lives in
different places, separate paths. It wasn't, like, one for all and all
for one." That said, when Ford came onstage at Comic-Con in July, he
kissed Fisher on the lips. "They acted like it was a porn shot," she
says archly. "It was too fast to be surprised. I was surprised at all
the pictures – you know ... elder porn!" Oh, come on ...
"I mean, you don't see a lot of movies where they celebrate older
people making out. Necking!" She has always had chemistry with Ford, who
is 15 years older. "Because he makes me nervous and I overcome it.
Imagine being 19 and running into that." She pauses. "He deserves a good
word. Formidable? I made people a little nervous with my, you know,
verbal liquidity, so that kept me safe, but you're not safe with him. He
can get around any of that. And if he's impressed by it, you don't see
it."
On the new movie, Fisher was on edge at first. "I was very nervous,
had a lot of memory problems – just horrific – and then it got better,"
she says. "Think about it, what it would be to make three of these
movies a million years ago, and now let's do it again, only you're 40
years older and there's a lot to live up to – or down. And people want
it to be the same but better! So there's pressure on it. But then you
get over yourself and say, 'By the way, it's about the younger people
doing it.'"
She is dispassionate in assessing her old performances, and is as
amused as anyone by the British accent she used in some early scenes.
"I'd just gone to drama school – in England!" she says. "The
biggest thing where I'm bad is one of the first scenes I shot, which was
'Governor Tarkin, I thought I recognized your foul stench when I was
brought on board!'" To prove the awkwardness of the line, she makes me
recite it to her. (This is, I realize later, one of the greatest moments
of my life.)
Fisher gives a long, entertaining tour of her property on my way out,
ending in one of her guest house's themed rooms. "This is the space
room," she says. Of course, it is filled with Star Wars
memorabilia, including a campy painted poster of the original characters
playing in a rock band. Leia is the lead singer. "You could use it and
put the new kids in," she says, breaking into an improvised song: "There
are new kids in spaaaaace."
Also in the room is a rejected original poster for the first film,
with the slogan "How many times have you looked up and wondered what was
going on," over a field of stars. I read it out loud, and Fisher
answers the question. "Every day!"
The day before, maybe five minutes after I left Hamill's house, a
Toyota pulled up next to me at a stoplight. In the passenger seat was a
young woman in full Princess Leia garb, apparently headed to a Halloween
party. It was as if the Force was sending some inscrutable message, and
Fisher isn't surprised. "No," she says. "They're everywhere."
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