10 Interesting Facts You Don't Know About 'Star Wars'

Star Wars officially came to life on May 25, 1977. In the past 44 years, the saga has filled many generations of children and adults alike with wonder and excitement. In this day and age, anything and everything can be found online. All the knowledge is right there at your fingertips. This article will focus mainly on the original trilogy. Since most fans and non-fans are quite familiar with the plot and characters, we will take a look at the action behind the scenes. Here are ten interesting facts you don’t know about Star Wars.

10. Star Wars Sound Effects

The iconic futuristic sound effects in the original trilogy came from sound designer Ben Burtt’s experimentation with objects he found around him. Some sounds were discovered entirely by accident. For example, the famous hum of the lightsaber came from when Burtt was carrying a microphone across the room, and happened to pass over a television set on the floor. The sound of Darth Vader’s breathing came from putting a microphone inside a scuba tank regulator. Chewbacca’s Wookiee roar is a combination of bear, walrus, lion, and badger sounds. The rancor growl came from Burtt’s creative manipulation of the sound of his neighbor’s pet dachshund’s angry snarls.

9. Star Wars’ Famous Opening Text Crawl

While the iconic opening text crawl at the beginning of every Star Wars movie is now a standard feature in most filmmaking software today, back in 1977, the text was filmed with a camera making a slow pass over 2-foot-wide die-cut yellow letters over a 6-foot-long black paper background. This process took about three hours. The opening text crawl we now associate with Star Wars was actually taken from Flash Gordon’s opening sequence.

8. The Trash In The Death Star Garbage Compactor Scene Was Actually Real!

George Lucas was known for trying to make his set as realistic as possible. Much of the set pieces and props were roughed up so that they would have a rugged, used look. This extended to real actual trash being used in the Death Star garbage compactor scene. The smell was so bad that Mark Hamill burst a blood vessel from trying to hold his breath. Peter Mayhew’s Chewbacca costume would reek for the rest of filming. Knowing this made the rush to get the trash compactor's deactivation even more meaningful. After all, they ALL wanted to get out of the smelly trash.

7. Kenny Baker And Anthony Daniels Did Not Get Along

C-3PO and R2-D2 were the best of friends onscreen. However, this was not true off-camera for the actors who played the droids. Kenny Baker, the man behind R2-D2, thought that Anthony Daniels, who played C-3PO, was very rude.

6. Chewbacca Inspired By Lucas’ Dog

"I had an Alaskan Malamute when I was writing [A New Hope]. A very sweet dog, she would always sit next to me when I was writing. And when I’d drive around, she’d sit in the front seat...Having her with me all the time inspired me to give Han Solo a sidekick who was like a big, furry dog." - George Lucas

The image of Lucas’ dog sitting next to him in his car was the inspiration for Han Solo’s furry wingman. Incidentally, his Alaskan Malamute Indiana would become the inspiration for the name Indiana Jones.

5. Yoda Was Almost A Monkey

To create the wise Jedi Master Yoda, George Lucas thought of using a trained monkey in a green mask carrying a cane. A crew member who previously worked with apes in 2001: A Space Odyssey pointed out that “the monkey’s just going to pull off the mask over and over again. It’s never going to work.” Instead, the puppeteer Frank Oz would bring Master Yoda to life. Incidentally, Lucas hired many people who worked on 2001: A Space Odyssey for A New Hope, which probably worked out for the better in this particular case.

4. X-wing Pilots In Shorts

During the filming of A New Hope, England was experiencing an epic heatwave. The actors were sweltering in their fighter suits. Mark Hamill confirmed that some of the pilots were wearing “only the top-half of their costume, attacking the Death Star wearing shorts.” Keep that in mind, when you see the famous Red Squadron making their attack run on the Death Star.

3. Tarkin’s Shoes

We all remember the menacing presence of Grand Moff Tarkin. He was instrumental in tightening the Empire’s iron grip on the galaxy. The man who believed in ruling by fear, however, was wearing comfortable carpet slippers on the set of A New Hope. Actor Peter Cushing’s feet were too large for the stock boots provided to him by the costume department. After suffering many scenes in the ill-fitting boots, he begged Lucas to only shoot him from the waist up so that he could wear his carpet slippers. Imagine the man who ordered the destruction of Alderaan actually wearing slippers at the time.

2. Luke Was Almost A Girl

In January 1975, George Lucas was working on the second draft of Adventures of Starkiller, Episode One: The Star Wars. Due to the script’s serious lack of female characters, and the rise of feminism at the time, Lucas rewrote the story’s protagonist Luke Starkiller as an 18-year-old girl. One concept drawing by Ralph McQuarrie even shows the female version of Luke Skywalker. After the addition of Princess Leia to his script, Luke went back to being male again.

1. George Lucas' Wife

When you think of the name Lucas and the Star Wars saga, you think of George. However, another Lucas that deserves recognition is George Lucas’s ex-wife Marcia. She was the film editor for all three movies making up the original trilogy, and won the Academy Award for Best Film Editing for her work on Star Wars: A New Hope. She was the one responsible for the climatic trench run scene in A New Hope.

"If the audience doesn’t cheer when Han Solo comes in at the last second in the Millennium Falcon to help Luke when he’s being chased by Darth Vader, the picture doesn’t work.” - Marcia Lucas

During the making of Star Wars, she was very critical of his script, and had a knack for creating strong characters. George would frequently bounce ideas off her.

"You can see a huge difference in the films that he does now and the films that he did when he was married." - Mark Hamill

Source(s): Cinema Blend, Reader’s Digest, Den of Geek