CLASSIC RAIDERS: SPIELBERG'S ACTING CLASS!

At ELSTREE STUDIOS, Steven Spielberg has a fun time with Harrison Ford emoting the look he wants from Indiana Jones's discovery of the speared cadaver of rival archeologist Forrestal, in one of the classic early scenes of RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK.

CLASSIC CHEWBACCA: ONE MAN AND HIS WOOKIEE!

In his workshop at ELSTREE, legendary British make-up artist Stuart Freeborn brings the Classic Trilogy Chewbacca mask to reality.

With thanks to Chris Baker for the image.

Fans of Stuart's work on the three STAR WARS films, and the rest of his spectacular career, including such notables as 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY and the SUPERMAN films, check out AFICIONADO's exclusive interview with him and his wife Kay in our exhaustive MAKING OF "RETURN OF THE JEDI" special issue from 2008, which is available here: http://www.starwarsaficionado.com/catalog/item/6975337/8512430.htm

LOOKING BACK: OBI-WAN LIVES!

Obi-Wan Kenobi makes the ultimate sacrifice for his escaping friends in STAR WARS.

Prior to March 1976, Sir Alec Guinness, playing the wise and noble Jedi Knight, Ben "Obi-Wan" Kenobi, thought he was going to survive his duel with Lord Darth Vader and go on to the Rebel Base on Yavin IV to provide both support for Princess Leia and encouragement to Luke Skywalker whilst piloting his ship against the Death Star. Here are the late 1975/ early 76 storyboards by famed UK artist Ivor Beddoes of the original sequence, which culminated in a shield door cutting the devil horned, helmeted Vader off from Kenobi (injured in battle, the Jedi is then helped back to the Millennium Falcon by Luke Skywalker):

George Lucas, however, had other ideas, and didn't want Sir Alec as an actor and Kenobi as a character having very little to do but stand in the background for the films final act. So, in advice and consultation with wife Marcia, he took the brave step of killing Kenobi off- a wise move that added drama and sadness to the film and gave it a harder edge-that main characters, despite their abilities, could be killed off unexpectedly in the STAR WARS saga- though it was a decision that Lucas struggled with right up to the start of the films shooting in Tunisia and which worried Guinness. Fortunately, Lucas also had a little plan of having Kenobi come back as a spectral Force voice at the end victory, which meant that a return of some kind for Guinness/Kenobi, in person or in voice-over, for the future (if the film was a hit) was possible.

"THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK" - AN IMAGE EXTRAVAGANZA

Left to right: Irvin Kershner watches Ford, Fisher and Billy Dee Williams in a break before filming our heroes infamous dinner with Darth Vader. One of many great rare images in THE MAKING OF THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK book, out now in the UK from AURUM PRESS.

VANITY FAIR have a lovely picture gallery of rare colour and B/W behind the scenes images from the new THE MAKING OF THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK book by J. W. Rinzler, which is in bookstores now.

Check out the gallery (which includes the great above image) here:

http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/features/2010/10/the-making-of-the-empire-strikes-back-201010?currentPage=10

CLASSIC IMAGE: REBEL ASSEMBLY!

Those determined Classic Trilogy detectives at the REBELSCUM autograph forum's area have managed to correctly identify all of the main UK stunt team that worked on RETURN OF THE JEDI as Rebel Commandos (click on the image for a larger scan. Note: Mark Boyle should be read as Marc Boyle) - most of which also attended the Yuma/ Redwoods filming, playing multiple parts including Jabba's mercenaries and Stormtroopers, with special permission (for reasons of filming continuity) from the US government at that time in 1982. The group, headed by legendary STAR WARS stunt specialist Peter Diamond, would pose for a series of fun behind the scenes images taken on the Emperor's Throne Room set, alongside Mark Hamill and Bob Anderson as Darth Vader, at some point at ELSTREE studios between February and April 1982 (with thanks to Chris Baker for sending the above image)

And here's some other images from that fun shoot:

CLASSIC IMAGE: DIA - NOGA ATTACK!

Luke almost becomes dinner for a tentacled beastie in this classic scene in the Death Star's trash compactor. Filmed in the UK's long hot summer of 1976 at ELSTREE, all of the principal actors had to wear diving suits under their costumes, whilst Chewbacca's fur began to smell very badly amongst the gunge. Mark Hamill also received a bad eye infection that lasted for a while, where he was unable to film certain close-up shots required in his to follow shooting of his X-wing fighter cockpit scenes. The Dia-noga creature itself was not the original design-which was abandoned for looking terrible (do any still photos exist of it?)- and a solitary tentacle was created instead as a replacement. The creature was later embellished with a stop-motion eye, operated by Phil Tippett, in post-production.

Despite all the problems, though, the scene is still quite rightly regarded as a classic.

CELEBRATION V: DICKEY BEER - DELETED SCENES ACTION MAN!

One of the nice things about Celebrations is the chance to meet and get autographs from many of the people who worked in front of and behind the cameras of the STAR WARS films, and to find out more about them and their work. Dutch Stuntman and Second Unit director Dickey Beer is one of the most recent new signees in the STAR WARS world and I had the chance to talk to him about some of his work on the final classic STAR WARS film: RETURN OF THE JEDI.

Its well known that he played one of the hired thugs at Jabba's Court (including the alien Barada, doubling for Boba Fett (for a part of his demise) and playing Luke on the skiff (at one point in the films editing Beer fights himself as both Luke and Boba!) during the exterior Sail Barge battle filmed in Yuma, Arizona during April 1982, was one of the Rebel Commando squad members on Endor, and an ILM filmed biker scout, but what you might not know is that he also played an Imperial Stormtrooper for a deleted action scene at ELSTREE, which we hope will be on the eventual Blu-ray. Getting into the Endor Bunker and reaching the shield control room wasn't as easy as it looked in the original cut of the movie, as Han and his commando squad literally walked into, and have to face off, with a squad of Stormtroopers. Beer recalls the scene started off with two Stormtroopers by a wall, which was obscured from Han and his party. Then the fireworks start and Beer's Stormtrooper, who was nearest to the wall, would be felled by an explosion. Beer doesn't recall the scene listed in the novelisation book where Chewbacca grabs a section of door and brings it down on the rest of the Stormtroopers (and I haven't seen any photo documentation for this, either), but does recall it was one of many sequences that he was involved in for JEDI that was cut. In location filming at the Redwoods, Beer, as well as being one of the Rebel commandos nearest Solo, Leia and Chewbacca when they are escorted out of the bunker (and seen below in this behind the scenes shot), would also be the Scout Walker captain shot by Leia when all hell breaks loose with the Ewoks surprise attack.

Beer, who has also had the privilege to work with three James Bonds and battle Harrison Ford in a deleted scene from INDIANA JONES AND THE TEMPLE OF DOOM (playing a Thugee guard who fights Indy on the sacrificial scaffold chamber (which previously housed Willie and lowered her into the volcanic pit), but Indy hits him with a long staff!), was an extremely pleasant and highly likeable person, and I look forward to seeing him again at future STAR WARS related events.

Above top image: Han - once again - walks into trouble in this deleted scene. With thanks to Lou Tambone from his STARWARZ.COM site.

BEHIND THE SCENES IMAGE: FALCON COCKPIT

Great image showing the Millennium Falcon's trusty cockpit and control panels-we think the image is taken from the set of RETURN OF THE JEDI-probably between February and April 1982- when a lot of the first and second unit filming (some of which was handled by Lucas) was being done at ELSTREE.