The original Star Wars was released in 1977, and ever since then we have been in love with all things Luke, Leia, Han, Darth Vader, and everything else with this iconic movie franchise.
We have scoured the depths of “A Galaxy Far Far Away” (and the internet) to uncover these rare photos that include:
- Chewbacca getting a makeover and groomed
- The actors that played C-3PO and R2-D2 (yes, there was actually a person inside of R2-D2)
- Yoda as you have never seen before
- The Making of The Death Star & Millennium Falcon
- Han, Luke, and Leia Outtakes
- And Much More…
Here we have a candid photo that show a bit of playfulness between the cast members as Carrie Fisher (Princess Leia) pokes her finger in to the slit that serves as the mouth on C-3PO.
While on the set of The Empire Strikes Back, she and Anthony Daniels who played the droid are joking around in between takes. Daniels and Fisher did actually get together pretty well together which is pretty surprising given the fact that Daniels was reported as being a bit hard to work with. Some of the other members of the cast and crew apparently had a few issues with him being disagreeable and unruly.
This was especially true between him and the actor who played R2-D2, Kenny Baker. Yes, there was actually a person inside of that metal thing. The two were both put into very uncomfortable suits which surely didn’t help with their tempers, and with the two being in so many scenes together, they couldn’t quite spend much time apart to chill their attitudes. To this day, the two don’t get along together. That is what makes this picture a bit of an outlier, seeing Anthony Daniels actually getting along with another with another cast member in such a pleasant way.
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C-3PO studying under an umbrella.
This picture is of the man who played C-3PO, Anthony Daniels, forced to rest against a leaning stand complete with an umbrella to shield him form the harsh sunlight. You see, during filming, he was actually inside the costume of C-3PO which many people actually thought was a puppet because of how thin it is.
It seemed there was no way for there to actually be a human being in there, but Daniels truly was put into a costume to play the role. The suit had to be made so thin and tight-fitting to give it an authentic robotic feel, that Daniels was more or less trapped in it. The animatronic movements that the character had in the movie were actually Daniels’ own movements, just restricted by the metal suit.
The stand eventually became necessary for him to rest himself because of how harshly the metal outfit limited his flexibility. He could no longer sit down in between takes, forcing them to improvise and build something he could use to rest while still standing. As you can see, they also needed a portable stand to hold up his rehearsal book as he could not utilize his arms enough to hold it up to his face.
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Special Effects bringing the movie to life.
This photograph is a behind the scenes look at one of the original film’s most ground breaking contributions to film, its special effects. The scene in question is the scene in which Luke flies around the Death Star looking for his mark to destroy it.
They are currently working to make the explosions that are necessary to bring the scene to life. Many miniature models of sets, locals, and objects were utilized in order to make everything appear real. This is often called practical effects, where filmmakers utilize real objects and creative filming techniques in order to create effects without the use of computer generation or heavy editing.
This is truly one of the things that allow the original Star Wars trilogy to stand out in the modern age. While many science fiction movies tend to lean towards the newest computer generation in their graphics and effects, Star Wars used real life as their effects. While the new ones wither away and time renders their visuals less and less impressive as technology improves, no effect can be better than reality, so Star Wars’ effects still hold up superbly. The George Lucas created effects company Industrial Lights and Magic was responsible for such groundbreaking technology.
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Luke getting instruction on Dagobah
Here we show one of the hidden heroes of the original trilogy, Irvin Kershner. While only having directed The Empire Strikes Back, Kershner’s influence could be seen in the films that would follow.
Here we see him directing Mark Hammill (Luke Skywalker) on the Dagobah set right before the introduction of Yoda. Kershner always valued personally interacting with his stars and writers to make sure everyone had an understanding of the scene’s direction. He grew up in Philadelphia and was a very astute student of the arts, especially music. He even went to art school after high school. He learned painting, writing, and eventually directing. The latter of which he discovered he had a knack for.
He began his career by directing a small television documentary that established him in the directing scene. He would then move onto directing a few smaller films before being offered the chance to direct Empire. Lucas himself had originally directed A New Hope, but found himself being distracted by his many other roles. Therefore, he passed on this monumental task to this up and coming film maker. Many people regard Empire as the best of the Star Wars films, but Irvin didn’t want to continue. He left to pursue his other film projects instead of directing Return of the Jedi.
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He has the whole world (or Death Star) in his hands.
This next picture is one of the construction of the terrifying Death Star. The battle station of enough fire power to completely wipe Alderaan out completely with a single blast.
Although the fictional version is such an immense instrument of destruction, it is rather humorous that the true, physical version that was used to create the legend is merely the size of a child. Good luck conquering the galaxy with that edition, Lucas. Speaking of Lucas, in the photograph we can see the man himself as he examines this crucial prop to the final realization of his vision.
From the rough model of this Death Star, we can see that it will be used for Return of the Jedi because of its deeply unfinished design. We can see as that which is supposed to represent foundation and building materials for the station. The original models that were built for the practical effects in scenes were constructed out of wood and plastic. After that, it was trick photography’s job to bring them to life. It is a bit of a shame that it will just end up being destroyed at the end of the film no matter how well they build it.
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“Hey, where is your hand?”
The man behind the legend as he works at what he does best. The fellow pictured with the glasses and the mustache is none other than Frank Oz. Oz, although not related to the wizard, has a magic in his own right, the ability to make objects come to life.
His career is a puppeteer and he is perhaps the most famous of all time. He not only controlled his marionettes, but also supplied them with their voices combining his skills as a ventriloquist with his skills as a voice actor. He was the one responsible for the impressive and life-like Yoda that was used in the fifth and sixth episodes and also returned to supply the voice of the computer generated version of his character in the prequel trilogy. Although this is probably his most famous work, his breakout role was as the puppeteer of Miss Piggy, Fozzie Bear, and Animal on the original Muppet show.
Jim Henson took interest in Oz’s talent and when contracted to build Yoda, suggested Oz should be the one to control it. In addition to his puppeteering, he also directed a great number of movies, including the hit musical Little Shop of Horrors. He still finds time to voice his green friend in today’s Star Wars works, including in the rides at Disney World.
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R2-D2 was made of wood?
This picture was taken during the first stages of shooting on A New Hope. As we can see, Lucas is posing next to the wooden frame for a droid that would be used for the film.
Although it may not be apparent at first, close inspection of its features will reveal that this is actually a primary design of R2-D2. The original frame for the robot was made out of sturdy, yet lightweight wood during the early days of filming to act as more of a stand-in to get a better idea of how scenes would play out once they got the real, furbished version complete.
The R2 dummy became quite a point of humor among crew members who, apparently, would take to hiding it and decorating it for birthdays and holidays. Eventually Lucas would decide on making the final version blue and white to make it have a pleasant and signature look. He also claims that he felt this would be a good choice to compliment the golden colors of C-3PO. Kenny Baker would go on to actually inhabit the final costume and perform the role. Wooden props would also be used to create many objects for the films, such as the Death Star and nearly all of the sets.
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“Thanks for the lift – you big hairy animal!”
This photograph was taken of Chewbacca and C-3PO as they prepare to shoot a scene in The Empire Strikes Back. There are quite a few interesting abnormalities that litter the photo here and there.
One of which is the mop and broom that are still in the corridor they are about to shoot down. Another is the peculiar wooden prop that the crew is using to aid them in the scene. It has a bunch of peculiar jutting and strangely angled wooden beams. Chewbacca seems to be gripping onto one of said beams in an attempt to pull it along. The contraption’s purpose appears to be able to help them with shooting C-3PO in this scene as just a torso.
At this point in the movie, C-3PO had already been torn apart and Chewbacca was carrying him around. Until later, the droid would be carried as his legs were removed, so filming that with the technology of the time would be difficult. Hence, a little ingenuity would be required to make it come to life. That ingenuity took the form of a small wooden contraption. It helped keep Anthony Daniels’ legs down and made them easy to edit out for the final cut.
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Yoda getting a facelift.
Here we see the final constructed face of the Jedi Master himself, Yoda. We see his voice actor, Frank Oz, as he examines the rubber face. Jim Henson and one of his puppet makers are looking on as well, getting an idea for how it looks so far.
Yoda was built of rubber over a plastic skeleton and mechanism to allow him to be controlled easily by Oz. Henson is perhaps the most famous puppet maker in history, creating the legendary Muppets. Henson began his career when he invented a puppet sketch show called Sam and Friends. Much of his fame began when he joined the fledgling Sesame Street of the 1960’s. He was responsible for the creation of most of the characters and their puppets that the show is known for today.
In the beginning of Saturday Night Live, he worked on the show creating puppet acts to entertain more adult audiences. After this, his prized Muppet Show was created, making him a household name. He made many Muppet movies, but also worked on other movies that called for his expertise, including Labyrinth and Star Wars. Henson will forever be remembered as one of the most creative men in film history, as well as an integral part of the creation of Star Wars.
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Yoda getting ready for a scene.
The above picture shows director Irvin Kershner as he works on his contribution to the original trilogy, The Empire Strikes Back. He and his assistant are setting up the Dagobah scene with its star, Yoda.
Yoda came to be from an interesting problem. With the first film, Lucas originally wanted Obi-Wan to survive and spend the next movie training Luke to become a Jedi Knight. However, as the film progressed, Lucas decided he would rather create a little more drama and suspense by killing the wise master off. This meant in the next movie, there would be no one to follow through on his original plan of training Luke to hone his skills. A new character had to be created to fill this role, which would be Yoda.
Yoda started out as an homage to the wise teachers of myths and fairytales. Unassuming people like Merlin or Gandalf, who just seemed like old men until you learned their power. That is how Lucas wanted Yoda to be, weak and frail looking to show that anyone can be great. They decided to make him green to give him a more distinct look from Obi-Wan and make him a recognizable figure. The decision to make him a puppet was also Lucas’s because he wanted to make him seem real, but still fantastic.
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“These AT-AT Walkers looked much bigger in the sale brochure!”
This picture shows yet more work by Lucas’s own Industrial Lights and Magic as they work to fabricate yet another scene for The Empire Strikes Back. This time they are trying to create the massive sense of scale needed to grant legitimacy to the colossal Imperial Walkers, the AT-ATs.
The walkers are minuscule in real life compared to how they are portrayed in the film, standing only two feet high as opposed to the twenty meters that they are made to appear in the films. They look more like a child’s toy when you see the prop that created the illusion. Many small cameras were employed all around on ground level pointing up at them to give the illusion of height. They also used this scaled set piece with small mountains so people would think that they dwarfed the icy mountains of the planet Hoth.
In order to make it appear the models were truly walking on their own in the film, the film crew employed stop motion using very many frames to not have it obvious. The walkers would also be used very briefly in the next movie in the Endor scene using the same methods and technology to animate their movements.
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“Luke, I am your Father – but I do not know who the rest of these people are.”
The most iconic scene of the entire series and a prime candidate for the most well-known scene in movie history, this picture was taken of the filming where they captured the scene where Darth Vader reveals he is Luke’s father.
Shot at the complex set for the inside of the Bespin Cloud City, the scene marks Luke’s coming to grips with this hidden truth as well as trying to decide whether or not to follow in the footsteps of his father by joining the dark side. You can see the full film crew as they are present trying to capture the moment with as much weight as it should carry. Many different cameras are employed to capture a variety of angles of the action.
We also see the man who wore the costume of Darth Vader as he has the mask off in the image. His name is David Prowse and he was a professional weightlifter, which explains his imposing stature, especially in the costume. Although James Earl Jones supplied the voice of the character, Prowse was responsible for actually acting out the scenes silently. You can also see that fans have also been set up to create the wind effect that would be prevalent through the scene.
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Mattress Pit.
How do you remove the drama from something as intense as the “I am your father,” scene? That’s simple, just zoom out slightly. Because of the need in this part for Mark Hamill to drop down after confronting the truth, it was necessary to take some safety precautions.
In order to remove some of the danger from the stunt, a special system was implemented hoping to make the landing as soft as possible. What better way to cushion the force of gravity than with dozens of mattresses and comforters?
We can see an entire warehouse’s worth of soft items piled around this special fall zone to prevent injury from occurring to the actors. Despite the height not being life-threatening, it is definitely better to be safe than sorry, especially in a setting as unpredictable as a film set. Also visible from this angle is the specially designated “Mattress Lifeguard.”
This man’s responsibility was to go into the fluffy mass and help get Hamill out of it after he had to jump. Now that’s a dream job ladies and gentlemen. Mattress pits are still used commonly in the film industry to help with free fall stunts however, now it is usually just one enormous mattress filling the pit.
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Editing in Storm Troopers
It turns out you don’t actually need a high-tech cloning facility to create an army. All it takes is a good artist and the proper effects equipment. The creators could have really saved the Republic some trouble by sharing that information.
All joking aside, this is a serious technique that was and is still used in order to fill in a large number of similar-looking characters in movies. While the particular technique being practiced in the image may be relatively unique, the basic principle remains the same. By drawing or digitally crafting the same basic model and recreating it multiple times, you can fill an army without needing to cast so many people to fill these rather generic roles.
In the modern day, we still have films doing this, usually opting to digitally render clones of a standard character model and filling the screen with them. The main difficulty of using this tricky technique is not overly-implementing it to the point that the audience is able to clearly tell when it is being shown to them and when it isn’t.
Back in the eighties, however, it was a painstaking process having the artist draw this many figures without making a single major error. You can see that some storm troopers in the picture bear fewer details than others, but this is because with as many subjects as there are, the audience probably wouldn’t notice a few absent lines.
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Maintenance of Droid Costumes.
As we have already discussed at various points throughout this article, the extreme difficulty the two actors playing our main droid characters had with their costumes is certainly considerable. They were hot, constraining, and obscured the vision of those wearing them.
Not only that, but because of the large composition of metal in the costume’s exterior design, they were prone to rusting and breaking after continuous strain. Because of the need for the metal to be lightweight and flexible, it was also prone to getting bent out of shape.
Thanks to this slew of problems, the need was present for maintenance and repairs to be performed on the outfits at regular intervals. Anthony Daniels’ C-3PO costume in particular needed to have entire parts and plates swapped out several times throughout the entirety of filming. This image was specifically taken to demonstrate this fact as minor repairs are being performed in between shots.
If you look closely, you can see that the C-3PO costume is missing the entire foot. At the same time, the dome of the R2-D2 costume had been removed and set aside as the crew was fixing some of the inner workings of that suit. It was also necessary to remove the head pieces for both of the actors so that they could get some fresh air in between shots.
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Break Time.
There are few things that are as refreshing as filming long scenes in the middle of a desert. I’m sure the cast and crew of A New Hope would have refuted this claim.
This picture shows break time on the set of Tatooine with the film crew, directors, and actors enjoying a little time off from the continuous filming in the strenuous heat. We can see the young Mark Hamill sprawled out upon the ground while Alec Guinness is merely kneeling with a severe expression.
The two actors playing the droids had to be carted off into the shade immediately whenever break was called due to the metal in their suits heating. Also, despite the blazing and oppressive sun that accompanied the shots in these desert scenes, there was still a need to bring along the light crews.
These individuals also seem to not be happy with the arrangement. The only comfort Lucas could offer to the crews to help them endure through these hard days was that it wouldn’t be much longer until they could film somewhere a little more temperate. Unfortunately for all present, they would be back to the blazing locale in a matter of years to film The Return of the Jedi.
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