Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with the new This Week In Star Wars.
I'm on a whirlwind international adventure (brag-brag-brag) so I didn't know if I would be able to carve out the time to get this week's installment of Star Wars nerdery up in a timely manner. Luckily I have a few hours between the Back to the Future interviews I just did (Christopher Lloyd and Lea Thompson were good chatters, by the way) and jumping on a flight to Abu Dhabi. Fancy, I know. The point is I got this shit done, son!
Some good stuff happened in the Star Wars Universe between July 20 and July 26. Let's see what we got, eh?
July 22nd, 1938 - Terence Stamp born. Stamp showed up in last week's column (remember, some fool thought he was going to play Young Tarkin in Episode 1 and the rumor spread all over the place) and now we get to wish him a happy birthday!
Stamp is an actor's actor and while I'm very happy he's part of the Star Wars universe his Chancellor Valorum is woefully too small a part for someone of his talents. Could you imagine how great of a villain he could have been? The dude is crazy intimidating. I mean, The Limey, anyone?
Anyway, the man's still around and kicking ass. Happy birthday, sir!
July 25th, 1941 - Peter Suschitzky born. Peter was the director of photography on The Empire Strikes Back so he's one of the men most directly responsible for how the movie looks. Empire's not his only great work, either. He did a great job with pretty much every David Cronenberg movie since Dead Ringers as well as perfectly capture the bubblegum card tone for Tim Burton's Mars Attacks.
Oh, and he also shot The Rocky Horror Picture Show.
It was actually pretty hard for me to dig up a picture of Suschitzky working on Empire, but I did get one with him in the background between a princess and a protocol droid without his plating on:
Thanks for all you do and all you have done, Mr. Suschitzky. Have a great birthday!
July 20th, 1945 - Harrison Ellenshaw born, matte artist.
I am fascinated by matte paintings. It's one of my all time favorite cinema aesthetics and it's all but a lost art these days. It wasn't so long ago that paint on glass was the go-to way to expand a shot and while digital mattes are way more controllable and have a beauty of their own, I still miss the subtle difference that is brought to a piece by an artist with a brush.
Harrison Ellenshaw (sometimes credited as Peter or P.S. Ellenshaw, when was his father's name) is one of the last living masters of this craft. He worked closely with his father who did amazing work with Powell & Pressburger on The Red Shoes, A Matter of Life and Death and Black Narcissus and some really iconic work for Disney, like with Mary Poppins and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.
The two worked together on The Black Hole and Dick Tracy, but Harrison will probably be largely remembered for his work on Star Wars. That photo above is just incredible, isn't it? Solely using paints, glass and perspective he filled a room filled with stormtroopers.
Here's some more images of Harrison at work:
Happy birthday, Mr. Ellenshaw and thanks for all you've done for us movie nerds!
July 22nd, 1969 - James Arnold Taylor born.
Taylor is a voice actor who made a big splash voicing Obi-Wan for The Clone Wars cartoons. Obi-Wan has yet to be portrayed badly. Think what you will about the prequels, but Ewan McGregor brought it and Taylor was able to honor both McGregor and Alec Guinness' performances with his portrayal of the cocky Jedi Knight.
July 20/21, 1978 - “Giant Slug” by Ralph McQuarrie completed.
It was a busy week for production artist Ralph McQuarrie. At this point in 1978 the machine was ramping up as production on Empire got closer and closer. Money was starting to get tight, but Lucas kept pushing forward bound and determined to make this thing work and work on his terms.
McQuarrie turned in a few pieces this week in 1978, the first being the concept of the Space Slug above.
July 21st, 1978 – The very first Star Wars re-release.
George Lucas was awfully ambitious in this crucial time in the development of his legacy. He had managed to work some legal miracles to get full control of Star Wars from Fox and thanks to him having the foresight to get the vast majority of the profits from the toys on the first movie he had the money to get Lucasfilm really off the ground.
However, the cost of setting up ILM in Northern California combined with the purchase of the land that would eventually become Skywalker Ranch and the ever growing budget of Empire meant his money was quickly running out. Banks were hesitant to lend to him and if he couldn't come up with the budget for Empire then he'd have to go to Fox and give them back ownership and control of his property.
The toys were making money, but not enough, so they decided to launch a re-release of Star Wars. There were some smaller towns that didn't get the movie on first run, but the main reason was purely to refill some of the coffers so Lucas could afford to get Empire in the can.
The re-release opened in 1700 theaters and would expand to 2000 before the end. People ate it up again. Remember this is before the days where you could just go rent a video of a movie you like (let alone buy a near 35mm quality DVD or Blu-Ray), so people were insanely happy to revisit the film a year later.
This release also marks a rather crucial moment in Star Wars history. It's the first time a young poster artist by the name of Drew Struzan contributed to a Lucasfilm production. The re-release needed a new poster and the one that Struzan and Charles White III worked on is one of my all time favorite Star Wars posters. It's known as the Circus Style poster and I'm proud to have a well-worn and beat up, but original one-sheet of this style in my meager little collection.
July 24/25, 1978 - “Dusk battle on Cloud City” by Ralph McQuarrie completed.
Another great piece of McQuarrie production art finished this week. Love how he jumped around, moving from giant space slugs to a beautiful twilight blaster fight on Bespin.
July 26/27, 1978 - “Rebel big gun, control booth” by Ralph McQuarrie completed.
I don't think we ever saw the inside of the Ion Cannon in Empire, right? Am I being a bad Star Wars fan? I can't picture it... The control room where Leia and Threepio are is a different location, yeah? Don't know, but if I'm right then this is an even more interesting piece because it shows us a glimpse at something we didn't get to see in the movie.
If I'm wrong, then pretend I never said anything!
July 26th, 1997 – Samuel L. Jackson appears on Letterman and talks about being cast in Star Wars Episode 1. Letterman asked him if he knew who he was playing, and he responded: "I have no idea. I asked George, and he said, 'Well, you'll probably be going, look out, run, duck, go that way', so I may end up anywhere between Lando Calrissian's grandfather and a Wookie."
Jackson showed up at BNAT this past year to support Kingsman's early screening and he told Harry about still being in the dark until he went in for his costume fitting and someone brought in a suitcase filled with different lightsaber handles and asked him which one he wanted. That's when he figured out he was going to be Jedi. Crazy, huh?
And that's it for this week! See ya' next Monday!
-Eric Vespe
”Quint”
quint@aintitcool.com
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