Some random Star Wars trivia today.
Before GL sold LucasFilm to Disney I read a long article about SW and learned a few tidbits:
- During the making of SW4, Lucas was openly despondent. The initial special effects were very late and of poor quality. It was over-budget and Fox had no faith in the movie. The unionized camera crew and staff refused to work after 5pm. So the actors did everything they could to cheer him up.
- Harrison Ford aggressively lobbied Lucas to kill off his Han Solo character in ROTJ or even ESB but Lucas refused.
- In later years Ford didn’t want to answer interview questions about Solo. He disdained the character and its importance to his career.
Disney required GL to convince Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, and Harrison Ford to reprise their roles in SW7.
When news of the sale of LucasFilm broke, I remembered the earlier article and thought that maybe Ford only agreed to participate in SW7 if they killed off Solo.
I didn’t think they would agree to that but I was wrong. (I was one of the few who anticipated Solo's possible death in SW7.)
Ford recently confirmed that he was the driving force: