I Am C-3PO--The Inside Story Read online

  Ahmed Best came on stage and took it over with his quick-witted humour. I took a moment to relax. I had miscalculated the time I would need to be on stage, introducing and interviewing the guests over three days. I hadn’t included any breaks. Not self-sacrifice – just stupid. Now I had a moment to myself. Ahmed was more than capable on his own, as he talked about his new character in The Phantom Menace – Jar Jar Binks.

  Pernilla August added a touch of serene glamour to the fairly masculine event. She was allowed to admit to playing Jake’s mother in the film. An utter professional and seasoned actor, she must have wondered what she was doing in a tent in Denver – in the rain.

  Possibly the highlight of the day was Ray Park who stormed the audience with his martial arts routine. He leapt and bounced around the stage in a hugely dynamic and engaging demonstration of his skill. It was the first time everyone got to hear John Williams’ signature music for this devilish character, The Duel of the Fates. And the fans loved it. So did I. And they loved Ray.

  But I did, reluctantly, give him a piece of bad news. No one had thought to tell Ray that his voice had been replaced by the actor, Peter Serafinowicz. It wasn’t my place to do so but I liked him enough to save him from the wound of finding out, as he sat with his friends in the cinema. It would have been kinder if someone in Production had prepared him. Peter is a super actor, with a fine vocal range but I think Ray is probably better with the lightsaber, especially the double one. Darth Maul continues to be one of my favourite characters in the Saga – brief but favourite.

  Stepping away from the stage, I was aghast at what the rain was doing. I’d heard it bouncing off the marquee’s roof but the pathway to the Star Wars Store was a swilling watercourse. The store was packed solid with fans, admiring the new merchandise, but they were all brownly muddied to the knees. In fact, the entire site seemed like a war-torn battlefield. The mud oozed and slopped everywhere. That evening the rain still torrented down as I wearily drove back to the hotel to dry out. At least we had all survived. I wondered what tomorrow would bring.

  Tomorrow brought more rain.

  The conditions were so bad that city officials had to turn away hundreds of devastated fans. The facilities just couldn’t safeguard the crowds against hypothermia and trench foot. Whenever I had the chance, I wandered down the lines of guests outside. The rain fell continuously but everyone I talked to was defiantly cheerful. The weather might have been kinder but all the fans were joyfully supportive of the whole event. They loved Star Wars. They loved being there.

  Back on stage, I was again wearing the gold jacket I’d had made especially for this Celebration. It was my way of celebrating See-Threepio and saying, don’t take me too seriously. Because I, too, was putting on a brave face. I’d never before been rained on, on stage. For my next entrance, I came on under an umbrella. But worse for me was stepping out into the audience.

  I was holding a radio microphone so I could catch reactions from the guests and amplify them around the auditorium. I wondered if I was going to get electrocuted. Then I worked out that they only had batteries inside, the main equipment being at a safe distance from me. As I stooped to point the mike at an enthusiastic fan, I felt something horribly weird. Though I was standing on the fake grass that carpeted the marquee, I was actually in a slight dip. It was filled with water so deep, it was gently flowing over the top of my shoes and filling them. I consciously reflected on my sense of misery as I poked fun at my interviewee, before squishing back up on stage. I leaked for the rest of the show. It was seriously depressing. But the day was over and people seemed to have had a good time. That was the main thing. Back on the seventh floor, I dried my feet and put newspaper in my shoes. I wondered what tomorrow would bring.

  It brought sunshine.

  I was back on stage, in my damp shoes and equally damp gold jacket. The sun glimpsed inside the marquee, bouncing off the puddles that had yet to drain away in the fake grass. As the programme went on, I realised I was hot and uncomfortable. I looked at my arms. They were actually, visibly steaming. The sunlight on the marquee, mixed with the dampened state of everything inside, was causing a fog bank to rise around us all – because we had all become one. We had all lived through an extraordinary event – even managed to enjoy it. To recall Shakespeare, I felt we few, we happy few, were indeed brothers. That people would hold themselves bereft they were not with us at Celebration.

  Dan Madsen would never brag about his achievement. So I will boast on his behalf. Against a series of formidable, unfathomable odds, he created a miraculous event that bolstered the spirit of everyone there. Regrettably, he was left to wring out the pieces by himself as the marquees were dismantled and the flooded fields began to heal. But he had started a tradition.

  Celebrations seem to come along like buses now. In Japan. In Europe. In America. Wherever it is held, Celebration brings fans together in a growing family of friends and like-minded individuals, making a global community – because of what Dan Madsen started with his wonderful, admirable spirit.

  As I drove to Denver’s airport, I passed a huge hoarding, still advertising the NRA’s convention. Charlton Heston’s stern-faced, noble portrait towered above me as he proudly clasped a rifle. The text below him?

  “Join us.”

  47 tchewww

  Another prequel.

  Somehow, my hoped-for pleasure of being on a Star Wars set again, was elusive.

  There were many people who were thrilled to be back. It was like a Star Wars reunion for the crew every three years. However, from my perspective, the experience was not a joyful one. I felt an uneasy atmosphere. No sense of joy – rather the opposite – a sense of an oppressive management ethos coming from above. George was busy directing the film – the actual production, naturally, being left to others. But there should be more to keeping a project on track than merely making the trains run on time. Considerate and respectful treatment of the cast and crew is equally important. Here, I sadly felt neither of these qualities was present to any degree. I wasn’t alone. Though bullying in the workplace is far less tolerated today, back then it seemed to be endemic on many productions, our film unfortunately being no exception.

  But at least they agreed, this time, I could puppeteer the skeletal Threepio. For me, it made artistic sense. It made economic sense too – they didn’t have to fly Michael out.

  But there were the pleasures of meeting Ewan McGregor and Sam Jackson. Both separately exclaimed their childlike disbelief at working with See-Threepio. I rather marvelled that I was working with these two friendly and talented actors. Though I was never in a scene with Christopher Lee, I did spend time with him, as we hung around the set, waiting. Here was a real bastion of cinema history. His endless, enthralling stories of his various filmic experiences made the hours pass quickly.

  The principal joy was that the production was filming in glorious Australia. I had enjoyed so many previous visits. But it always feels more special if you have a reason to travel, a purpose, a belonging. And here I was, trying to belong.

  I was rehearsing in “Creatures” at Fox Studios, surrounded by an eclectic collection of rubber heads and limbs. As I worked, a team of modellers and sculptors were transforming plaster casts into tentacled aliens. The intriguing results were stored all around the workshop like a mad freak show.

  Don Bies, Justin Dix and the team attached me to the droid puppet. It was heavy, cumbersome, awkward. I wondered if my taking on the task was a mistake. The contraption was planted on my front, attached at the feet, hips, shoulders and my helmeted head. Sticks in my hands, attached to its elbows. Truly, we were an item.

  This time, there were indeed large mirrors, helping me to see the effect of what I was attempting. I spent hours rehearsing in this rig, reminiscent of a Steadicam harness. I remembered the Japanese art of Bunraku – magic theatre created by black-clad puppet masters, ignored behind their exotic creations. They wer
e free-standing while they manipulated their exquisite figurines. Not me. I was conjoined. My puppet’s head movements mirrored mine. Looking down to see where my feet were on the floor, was not an option. Where he didn’t look, I didn’t see. I would have to trust the crew to keep me upright. Eventually, I learned to walk and stand with reasonable credibility. I was ready.

  The first shot had Threepio sitting down. Nice to have been warned. So now I was in Owen’s garage, kneeling painfully on the floor, attached to my seated nemesis, nervous – self-inflicted. We began. Padmé looked deliciously serene in her blue nightgown, bathed in the twilight of the room. She had earlier arrived at the Homestead with Anakin. But that was yet to happen, so the, as yet undamaged, puppet was still in one piece.

  INT. TATOOINE – HOMESTEAD – GARAGE (FULL MOON) – NIGHT

  ACTION!

  “Please don’t leave us, Miss Padmé. These people need your help.”

  “I’m not leaving, Threepio. I just can’t sleep.”

  “That’s something I cannot relate to. As a protocol droid, I’m either active or inactive. There’s no in–between.”

  “I guess you’re lucky.”

  “Do you really think so...? I suppose I shouldn’t expect...”

  “You’re not happy here?”

  “Oh, I’m not unhappy... and my masters here are so kind I wouldn’t wish to trouble them, it’s just... being like this... well, it’s embarrassing.”

  “Being like what?”

  “Naked. If you pardon the expression. You see, when Master Ani made me, he never quite found the time to give me any outer covering. It’s so humiliating. How would you like it, if you had to go around with all your circuits showing?”

  “I guess I wouldn’t like it at all.”

  “Of course you wouldn’t. Nobody would. It’s simply not protocol.”

  “Maybe we can do something about it.”

  “I don’t think so. Only Master Ani...”

  “Why not? They seem to have a box of old coverings here.”

  “Oh? How observant of you, Miss Padmé. Of course, I’m just not mechanically minded... if you see what I mean.”

  “Let’s see, if we put this... here...”

  “Ooooh! That tickles.”

  Sweet. But surely, Threepio was never that unobservant. He’d lived in this space for eighteen years, and never noticed a box of coverings? The scene ended with Natalie offering up a chest piece to the waiting droid.

  Cutting back from a different thread, Threepio stood there, nearly whole. Natalie proffered up his golden face. Don had stuck fridge magnets around the back piece, now clamped to my head. I was wearing Threepio’s eyes on a special rig that Don had built, too. Natalie had to finesse the face, with opposing magnets, over the wires and lenses, onto the back of the head piece. It wasn’t easy, rather like a game show challenge – it took several goes. But now, with a satisfying Click, Threepio was complete, whole, ecstatic. How joyful everyone was – Padmé, Aunt Beru, Uncle Owen. Assuredly, too, the audience who, at last, would recognise the beloved figure of their childhood. The scene was cut. All of it. George said it slowed things down.

  Of course, he’d written the scene in the first place. In playing it together with Natalie, the moment became really quite moving. At last you were given a glimpse of Threepio’s inner feelings, as well as his inner workings. There was a genuine feeling of pathos, at least for me. Action films can surely benefit from the odd moment of tranquillity. And in this case, the audience already knew Threepio so well, I think they would have appreciated the sensitive insight the sequence revealed. I’m sorry George decided there wasn’t time for it. But before he made that editorial decision, a worse fate awaited the hapless droid. And me.

  Thousands of miles away from Fox Studios, in a hole in the ground, I was politely introducing a young Aunt Beru and Uncle Owen to my returning Maker and his girlfriend, Padmé. We were back in the underground dwelling at Matmata, far away from its exterior domed entrance. That was many miles down the road on the salt flats of Tozeur. Movie magic again.

  More practically, I assessed the rock floor in front of me. Naturally, it was rather uneven. I suggested it might be prudent to lay down some boards and even out the surface. There weren’t any boards. I’d just have to be careful then. And so we began. First, with a wide, establishing shot, then I successfully manipulated the weighty puppet through five set-ups and many takes, without incident. Now it was Threepio’s close-up.

  INT. TATOOINE – HOMESTEAD – DAY

  ACTION!

  “Master Owen. May I introduce…”

  As before, I stepped forward, looking straight ahead, triangulating on nearby, fixed points. The puppet’s face leading me forward, the puppet’s doomed feet, pinned to mine. My foot? The puppet’s foot? A foot struck a stone. I was falling. Falling. My world was in slow motion, as I fell straight down onto my left side. The puppet’s left side. Threepio’s left side. The sound was frightening. The ensuing silence, profound. Don’s distant voice approaching as he ran.

  “Are you okay!”

  I wiggled my toes. My spine must still be in one piece. Feet running closer. Don was there, urgently unstrapping me from the giant doll. Others helped me up. I was shocked. Then I looked down. Threepio lay there, abandoned on the stones. His carefully crafted thigh, a shattering of parts. I was doubly shocked. I had smashed a unique prop. The only Threepio puppet in the world, let alone in a Tunisian desert. But my shock was for something else, too. I felt I had wounded my friend, hurt him irretrievably through my clumsiness.

  “Hey. It’s your close-up.”

  Don opened his tool kit and took out a pair of metal cutters. He snipped the puppet literally in two.

  ACTION!

  I stepped forward, confident in my own shoes, balancing just the top half of naked Threepio against my chest.

  “Master Owen. May I introduce…”

  It was suddenly so easy. But it wasn’t the first time I had fallen. It wouldn’t be the last.

  It was an accepted fact that Threepio had somehow acquired his coverings in between Episodes I and II. Possibly, moisture farming was not Uncle Owen’s only talent. Perhaps, in an intense fit of embarrassment, the naked droid had seen the box of parts lying on the garage floor and got dressed by himself. Either way, it was Justin who did an extremely convincing paint job on one of my gold outfits – turning it to rust. We had shot everything with the puppet for real. Now I had to re-enact each scene, wearing brownish grey, on a blue screen, or it might have been green. But the show wasn’t over yet. Was this the time I would really break my neck?

  They seemed strangely unconcerned that I might damage myself – expecting me to stop dead when I reached the open doorway, some twenty feet above the studio floor. Of course, I couldn’t see the edge. But they offered no safety harness, to prevent me crashing onto the pads below. They did briefly consider tying a rope around my waist, attached to a railing at the back of the set. In street clothes, with clear vision, it wouldn’t have been too bad. But dressed as I was in rusty Threepio, I was surprised at their seemingly cavalier approach. I would recall the moment, many years later, in a sequel, as I clung to a racing speeder, safely harnessed aboard by a caring team. Here was not so nice. And the scripted lines didn’t help either.

  INT. GEONOSIS – DROID FACTORY

  “Machines making machines! How perverse.”

  Quite. In the end, George decided to do the fall digitally. The resulting sequence is not ILM’s greatest hour, or Threepio’s, or mine.

  Back, nearer the studio floor, in the world of blue, I was standing on a rolling road, rather like an airport travelator – the kind of transport that makes people forget they have legs as they stand there, just blocking it up. But I had this track all to myself.

  ACTION!

  The road began to move backwards as I ran forward, shuddering aw
ay from imaginary dangers overhead and around me.

  CUT!

  The road stopped and I walked back to where I started. We did it again. It would make the shortish roller seem much longer in the finished edit. I decided to be helpful. Instead of walking back on a stationary roller, I ran back while it was still moving and repeated my journey forward – two or three times.

  CUT!

  The road stopped. So did I. At that moment the distraction of concentrating, and the adrenalin, wore off. I found that I couldn’t expand my wanting-to-pant lungs at all. No one could see my anguished face inside the mask. I was dying. I managed to use my last breath to yell.

  “GET ME OUT!”

  Don was there in a moment. He did just that. Perhaps I would be less helpful in future.

  But now I had something I’d always wanted. Since gripping anything with my hands was still a challenge, Don had to wire it into my fists – a blaster, of my very own. This was something new for Threepio. Well, nearly Threepio. I was fully dressed in his rusty outfit. But in the final edit, ILM would replace his head with one from a battle droid. Either way, I stood in a largish sand pit and aimed the weapon past the camera. I got myself into commando mode.

  EXT. GEONOSIS – EXECUTION ARENA – DAY

  ACTION!

  “Die, Jedi dogs! Die!”

  CUT!

  I had found it impossible not to make Tchewww Tchewww Tchew noises, as I pressed the trigger and faked the gun’s recoil – probably be the same if they’d given Threepio a lightsaber – all those Vmmmmm Vmmmm sounds. But the crew were amused – especially by something else. “Die, Jedi dogs! Die!” were the words I eventually recorded in ADR. By the howls of mirth from anyone watching and listening on set, it was obvious that’s not what I said at the time. I couldn’t resist substituting “Jedi dogs” with another two-word expression. The laughing crew never knew that Threepio’s facility with communication included some fairly major expletives.