“Three days after I started, I gave an interview to The Daily Mail, a national British newspaper,” Prowse would say. “And the reporter told me Vader would be killed off. I couldn’t believe it. He also told me another actor would play the dead Vader. I thought that was nonsense. I said, ‘They would never do anything of the sort. I’ve played Vader for seven years. They wouldn’t do such a dirty deed to me. They wouldn’t put another actor in the suit, and when my big moment arrived, unmask somebody else.’ He suggested I check the Call Sheets and look for the listing of an actor named Sebastian Shaw. I checked the sheets, and lo and behold, there was Shaw’s name—but there was no character listed next to him. I couldn’t understand it. I asked Howard Kazanjian about it and he denied they were using another actor.”
“I would not have lied to David,” Kazanjian would say. “I would have avoided the question and answered or steered it in another direction. I don’t recall [this moment], but I doubt that a reporter told Prowse someone else would be playing the unmasked Vader.”
The same day that Shaw had a fitting, Prowse, coincidentally or not, talked of Vader’s potential reveal to Garrett: “I’m eternally grateful to Star Wars, as now I’m an internationally recognized actor and all actors crave recognition. I think any actor would give his right arm to be in anything as successful, albeit I play a character in a mask … I just hope that when they come to unmask me, I’m not too old.”
THE PUPPET MASTER
On Tuesday the Emperor arrived. “It was four hours to do my face,” McDiarmid says. “I managed to get up at 3:30 AM to get myself ready. George told me, joking, ‘Now, I want you to go to bed as late as possible, so you can get up looking your worst.’ So I did. I would crawl down to the car, and then to the studio. Nick Dudman, who designed my makeup with Stuart Freeborn, would take over, and I would just lay there really. I didn’t have to cooperate very much as they stretched and pulled my face about.”
“Ian would be in the chair when I arrived at the studio at 7:30 or 8:00 and he would still be in the chair at 9:00,” says Marquand. “God, it really was hard, just the hours alone.”
The partial shuttle sits in the gigantic Death Star hangar set on Stage 6, the Star Wars Stage. Maintaining the reflective brilliance of the hangar’s black floor necessitated constant polishing (note crew members with mops on the left).
The Imperial shuttlecraft under construction.
McDiarmid as the Emperor descends the shuttle ramp on the Death Star hangar set. Crew would hand McDiarmid strawed drinks between takes, but “Eating was more difficult,” he says. “Nick Dudman would say, ‘You can chew a bit and I’ll retouch it later.’ But that was a little difficult, because if the rubber around my mouth had worked loose, it would have taken Nick an hour to fix, and they might have wanted me on the set immediately.”
Normally, McDiarmid was in makeup by 6:30 AM, where Dudman and his team would first cover the actor’s face with “gunk”; then they would add the rubber appliances and various other parts, while his hands were also modified. The last touch was the contact lenses. “I didn’t have to worry about my hair, because I wore a cowl and a rubber dome on my forehead,” the actor says. “I had very long hair because of another role, so it was tied in a ribbon. Seeing myself that way was fascinating, though it sounds very narcissistic to say so. A bit of the face was me—my nose, my mouth, my eyes—but they looked different. The makeup was entirely based on the aging process, not jokes or fantasy. That’s the way the face goes, the way everything sinks in and drops.”
“I’d come into makeup and Ian would be nearly finished having been there already two or three hours,” Hamill would say. “And then it would take an hour or so to get the stuff off, whereas I would usually just shower, change clothes, and jump in a car. So it occurred to me that unless I invited Ian over to the house, I was never going to know what he looked like; so we had him over for a Sunday dinner. What a surprise it was to see him show up with that shock of red hair and so much younger than what he was playing.”
“The main character and arch villain was intended to be a Methuselah figure kept alive and intact by some unknown magic,” Tippett would write. “Our intention was to create through makeup an age-wrinkled face with a large split cranium that was beginning to grow apart. We felt the Emperor should be ancient, not old, so the quality of the wrinkle was important. The enlarged skull was a foam latex appliance that carefully joined the actor’s face. Black and rotting teeth added an extra wild quality that we hoped would enhance the Emperor’s treacherous dialogue. We felt he should have both a detached look and a piercing stare. Eyes being the windows of the soul, we were required to use contact lenses.”
“It was so nice to have Phil and his boys over here,” says Freeborn. “All working together this time. Phil loved it and we loved it.”
“Nick Dudman said, ‘It’ll take me about four hours to make you the oldest man in the world and possibly the most evil,’ ” McDiarmid says. “And he did. All these things helped me suggest a person other than someone who just ran things. They gave the character an added dimension, which is what I was really looking for in playing the part.”
“It’s a wonderful moment in the movie when the Emperor comes out of that shuttle,” says Marquand. “It’s astonishing. The robes of those red troops. But you’re talking about filming 200 people and you’re watching the main action—when you suddenly notice there’s a guy who is still putting his helmet on! You think, What is going on?! And you have to go again.”
“The first scene we shot was the hangar in one of the biggest studios in Europe,” McDiarmid says. “I hadn’t been in it before. I walked into this hangar, in makeup for the first time, my eyes slightly hurting, and trying very hard to adjust to what was happening. I saw what looked like 3,000 people and I said to Michael Pennington [Jerjerrod], a friend of mine, who was standing next to Vader, ‘You didn’t tell me. I thought it was going to be a quiet party just for the three of us.’
“I was taken up to this high scaffold. They pointed me in the right direction and, suddenly, there was steam and smoke, the ramp shot down, and all these people in red and black preceded me. Then there was a voice, ‘Cue Emperor!’ and down I hobbled. It was an extraordinary first day. Doing it was a fantasy for me. As a kid, I had always wanted to play villains; they’re always the most interesting characters.”
A HUMAN REVEALED
Contractually obligated not to discuss any film secrets with anyone, even his family, veteran actor Sebastian Shaw started his one day of work on Wednesday. “I remember going down to Elstree Studios,” he would say. “I was whisked straight away into a caravan and my lunch was brought to me, makeup came to me, and then I was hustled into the studio—nobody saw me. It was all completely secret. I think many people—even some of them who had to do with the administration—didn’t really know [what was going on].”
When Shaw arrived on set, he espied McDiarmid, who, somewhat surprised, asked him what he was doing there. “I don’t know, dear boy,” Shaw responded. “I think it’s something to do with science fiction.”
Having served in the Royal Air Force during World War II, Shaw was primarily known as a Shakespearean actor, but had performed in many films, including Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s first collaboration, The Spy in Black (1939). In Shaw, Lucas and Marquand felt that they had found an actor with the experience to play the scene effectively, but unknown enough so as not to bring up other cinematic memories.
“Our most important makeup was also the most subtle,” Tippett would write. “Vader was designed to look as though he had been wounded in battle, with a large chunk of his cranium missing. Makeup appliances were engineered, not to cover the face with ghastly mutilation, but to justify why the man had to seek refuge in a mechanical body.”
“Everybody concerned—director, producers—were watching that scene, all the time, with hawk-like eyes, because it was so important,” Shaw adds. “Richard Marquand directed the scene, but George
Lucas was around all the time keeping an eye on because, after all, Star Wars is his baby. And they were very careful, clearly. There was the huge Star Wars Stage—but it was vast and it was empty. They had cleared it completely, except for the absolute minimum of people. We worked fairly hard that day. The scene was so beautifully written that we never altered the dialogue at all.”
Marquand and crew film Prowse’s closeups as Vader for the Emperor’s arrival scene (McDiarmid is not on camera perhaps to afford the crew their preferred angle).
A group shot of Imperial extras from the Emperor’s entourage.
Dolly grip W. C. “Chunky” Huse, operating cameraman Alec Mills, focus puller Mike Frift, and second assistant cameraman Simon Hume.
Watching Shaw as Vader gave Kazanjian an idea. “George was terrific and would sometimes listen to suggestions,” he would say. “So I said, ‘When Yoda and Obi-Wan Kenobi are in that ghost effect at the end of the picture, why don’t we have Darth Vader there?’ The next day he said, ‘Let’s do it,’ and I felt good, because I was contributing something to the film that George liked and accepted.” (Though perhaps forgotten, it had been Lucas’s original idea, in an early outline, to bring back Vader as Anakin in the end.)
“It’s always daring to take off the mask, whether it’s the Phantom of the Opera’s or Dr. Doom’s, because people’s imaginations are far more comprehensive, so there’s always a chance that you will disappoint them,” Hamill would say. “But to see Vader that vulnerable, laid out on the ground, with a scarred face and the bald head, it was very poignant; it was very moving, given the fact that he had found redemption and turned on the Emperor that way. I remove the helmet and I do it very gently …”
“When that dreadful mask was taken off, Mark nearly took my ears with it,” Shaw remembers. “But Mark was absolutely delightful to work with. He was very kind and maybe even appreciative, to an old actor like me. He was also very nervous with the scene because, quite suddenly, a new dimension came into the whole thing, a real and genuine emotion. There weren’t hundreds of takes or anything like that. Mark Hamill had a few, for his closeup, because he was so terribly anxious to get it just right.”
REPORT NOS. 34–36: THURSDAY–MONDAY, FEBRUARY 25–MARCH 1; STAGE 4—INT. DEATH STAR, EMPEROR’S ROOM, SCS. 52 [EMPEROR TELLS VADER TO RETURN TO SHIP], 73 [VADER TELLS EMPEROR LUKE ON ENDOR], 96 [LUKE BROUGHT BEFORE EMPEROR], 107 [DEATH STAR OPERATIONAL], 114 [LUKE GRABS LIGHTSABER], 118 [“I AM A JEDI, LIKE MY FATHER BEFORE ME”]; SECOND UNIT: STAGE 6—INT. DEATH STAR, MAIN DOCKING BAY, SCS. 4, 95, 127, 31, 96
Marquand studies Sebastian Shaw (aka “The Man,” Vader unmasked), with Kazanjian (on left).
Vader (Shaw) is unmasked as he dies with Luke (Hamill) watching.
Makeup artist Peter Robb-King and costume assistant John Birkenshaw help Sebastian Shaw into his Darth Vader costume. (Note the widely spaced stitching on the leg of the costume. That larger stitching meant it was a bodysuit that had been made for promotional purposes for Empire. These suits were probably made smaller than those for David Prowse, in order to fit promotional performers, and that is why it was used for Shaw.)
The ultra-secret script page describing Vader’s death, with last-minute dialogue written by hand.
A sheet of unit photographer Arthur Clarke’s production stills from his day shooting the death of Vader, as played by Shaw (Peter Robb King is applying Shaw’s makeup).
Leaning on the Emperor’s throne, Lucas confers with McDiarmid, Hamill, and Marquand.
“The chair was a great device,” McDiarmid would say. “It had been completely electrified, so it could move, but it didn’t move at the tempo that George and Richard needed for the camera. The guys tried to slow it down, but it didn’t have different speeds, so George said, ‘Ian, could you just try moving it with your feet?’ After that they didn’t bother to mechanize it at all. I’m doing small feet movements underneath my cloak in order to time it perfectly and hit the mark.”
Vader (swordsman Bob Anderson) duels Luke, as the Emperor watches gleefully (the lightsaber glows would be animated in postproduction). During breaks in the shoot, “I just sat in my room, surrounded by mirrors,” says McDiarmid. “I saw this creature staring at me, and I did, I’m afraid, spend a great deal of time just looking at this thing that we had all created, the Emperor. It gave me a sense of what I looked like from my own point of view, while I was acting.”
Second assistant cameraman Martin Kenzie with an oversized clapperboard that denotes a VistaVision shot.
Concept art of the Emperor’s throne room by Reynolds, October 1981.
Main unit moved from the mammoth Stage 6 to the smaller Stage 4 where the Emperor’s throne room was waiting for scenes among his lordship, Vader, and Luke; those scenes would be filmed in story order. “Mark Hamill is such a good actor,” McDiarmid says. “It was absolutely no problem to work with him. We had a complete rapport on and off-screen, so all those initial fears of joining the series were overcome. Usually, that’s what makes people act better, the person with whom they’re acting.”
As for Vader, Prowse was continuing to have problems. “David would endlessly say to me, ‘But I can’t see, I can’t hear,’ ” Marquand says. “And I would say endlessly to him, ‘I know, I know, I tried it on … I know.’ ”
At the time, Prowse said that he enjoyed working with Marquand, though he later, publicly, changed his tune. “I received no direction whatsoever from Marquand,” he would say. “I never had much of an association with him. I was never allowed to get close to him. As long as I understood a scene’s mechanics, he didn’t discuss my motivation or how I should deliver my lines.”
“One of the most difficult things about this film was reacting to Dave Prowse in the Darth Vader costume,” says McDiarmid. “Not only was Dave’s voice markedly different from James Earl Jones’, but so is his speech rhythm. Richard would say, ‘I think you have to imagine that Vader will be taking longer to say that line,’ so I had to learn Dave’s dialogue as well as mine. Dave would do his lines and, having seen the other two films, I would imagine how they would sound in the finished film.”
It was also probable that Prowse wasn’t even saying the scene’s real lines, due to the ongoing secrecy. Adding to the confusion, in fact, were script revisions that Lucas was still making, with at least one crucial alteration affecting the scenes in the throne room. “I think we’ve achieved a sense of jeopardy until the very end,” says Marquand of the changes. “The temptations facing Luke are so enormous that you cannot actually see how it’s possible to solve them and save him. It’s such a complex situation. George and I had long conversations about the Emperor and the final act of the movie and how the Emperor would turn the tables on Luke. And George went away writing and he came up with the most terrible double-cross. You have no idea what this revolting little man can pull off.”
The revised pages brought Luke’s thoughts about Leia during his fight with Vader to the fore. Luke surrenders his lightsaber, which rolls across the floor to his father, who hooks it onto his belt.
VADER
Give yourself to the dark side, Luke. It is the only way you can save your friends … Yes, your thoughts betray you, son. Your feelings for them are strong, especially for … Vader stops and senses something. Luke is in anguish as he senses Leia’s pain. Vader moves forward, looking for his son.
LUKE
No!
VADER
Sister? Your feelings have now betrayed her, too … Twins! Obi-wan was wise to hide her, but now his failure is complete. If you will not turn to the dark side, then perhaps she will.
Suddenly Luke’s lazer sword flies off Vader’s belt and the Dark Lord turns to see his son standing before him with lazer sword alight.
LUKE
Never!
Their lazer sword fight recommences with a frenzy not seen before as Luke’s “hatred forces Vader to retreat.” Luke cuts off Vader’s right hand “and realizes how much he is becoming like his father.”
In this final revision to the duel, Lucas worked out in his mind the emotional mechanics of the script, as Luke, Vader, and the Emperor stage their “Mexican standoff”: “The core of all this thing is [that] the Emperor is the master and Vader is the apprentice,” Lucas would explain. “He knows that if he gets into a lazer fight with the Emperor, he won’t win. He knows his son can’t win. Neither one of them can beat the Emperor. Together they might. In the first sequel he reveals that when he says, ‘Together we can rule the universe.’ That’s still his plot in Jedi. It’s just that his son has said, ‘No, I’m not going to do that.’ So that’s a bit of a problem.
“Vader also knows that the Emperor is toying with Luke. He has been told by the Emperor, ‘When he starts to strike me, you’re going to have to take him out.’ If Vader doesn’t block Luke’s lazer sword, the Emperor could just raise his hand and that would be the end of it. Then Vader would be in trouble: ‘Lord Vader, what happened to you? Did you not get your cue?’ So Vader knows what the Emperor is doing to the kid—instead of Vader turning Luke to the dark side, maybe the Emperor can. Vader doesn’t care who does it [because then father and son can unite].
The Making of Star Wars: Return of the Jedi (Enhanced Edition) Page 33
