Beast
04-13-2002, 09:51 PM
I am a member of Media Plays club, where you get points and special magazines for being a member. And the latest magazine from them had a interview with Hayden Christensen and Anthony Daniels. I am typing up the A.D. one for now, as the Hayden one is even longer, and I will do it when my fingers relax. :D Enjoy!!
Same Suit, Different Movie
Anthony Daniels isn't a master of Star Wars trivia, but the man who plays C-3PO is getting used to the whole droid thing.
By Stephen Lynch
You may think a movie series as expensive as Star Wars could afford a few upgrades. But no. When Anthony Daniels climbed into android C-3PO's skin for Episode II, it was the same constricting, suffocating shell he'd first worn more then 20 years ago.
"I would look at Hayden [Christensen, who plays Anakin Skywalker] with his beautiful clothes, and think, "I want his role;" Daniels admits, in a familiar woebegone British accent. Even R2-D2 got an overhaul, "and if 3PO realizes that, he's going to be very, very hurt. He's suffered enough."
C-3PO seems to be made to suffer. That's his lot in life. And Daniels' lot, much to his suprise, is to play the most put-upon, persnickety cyborg ever to grace the screen. During the original 1977 film, "I'm saying, 'Hello, I am C-3-P-O', and thinking it was just rubbish, silly. I didn't think it would work at all," he says. "I was proved so wrong."
Just how wrong he was became apparent when Daniels found himself returning, four films later, to the same set in the Tunisian desert that kicked off the first Star Wars. This time around, we'll meet Luke Skywalker's future foster parents, Owen Lars and Beru Whitesun, and learn a little about what pushed Anakin Skywalker to become the evil Darth Vader.
"I also get to do something I've always wanted to do, something you've never seen C-3PO do before....," Daniels says, before he's cut off by a representative from Lucasfilm. "I can't tell?" the actor laments. "Let's just say it's out of charecter...but it becomes his charecter."
Daniels does let slip that 3PO gets his skin in this episode, though it looks more ramshackle than in later chapters, with silver and gold junkyard parts. In The Phantom Menace and early parts of Attack of the Clones, C-3PO is an animatronic creation operated by Daniels and other puppeteers. For those early scenes, the gangly android was attached to the front of Daniels' body, mimicking his movements, and Daniels was later erased, "like some awful Russian way of redefining history."
Fans can also look forward to a scene in which C-3PO is somehow maimed or decapitated, a feature of almost every Star Wars movie.
"George [Lucas] is a decent person, but he has a strange predilection for dismantling C-3PO," Daniels says. "It's like pulling the wings off flies. He does it every chance he can."
Though Daniels considers this "slightly cruel," he understands what makes it a series mainstay. "3PO has no sense of humor- that's like his main source of comic potential." he says.
As one of the only actors to appear in every Star Wars movie, Daniels has made peace with the fact that C-3PO is his signiture role, even if he's still trying to figure out the plot line. When Lucas told him he was constructed by Anakin, "I thought, "How lovely, because Alec Guinness was so kind to me on Star Wars, it was great to be created by his charecter."
Of course, Guinness played Obi-Wan Kenobi, "and Anakin is the other one," Daniels says, sighing deeply. "I only just figured out making this one, that, oh, Amidala is going to be {Princess Leia's] mom."
While he may not know as much as the fans do, Daniels does have moments that make all the suffering in the suit worthwhile. "Parents come up to me with their kid, and they look at [me] with such disintrest. And [I] tell them to close their eyes and..."- at this point he breaks into C-3PO, a deeper, more polite British voice than Daniels' own- "...and their faces just light up. I cannot tell you the joy that gives me."
Same Suit, Different Movie
Anthony Daniels isn't a master of Star Wars trivia, but the man who plays C-3PO is getting used to the whole droid thing.
By Stephen Lynch
You may think a movie series as expensive as Star Wars could afford a few upgrades. But no. When Anthony Daniels climbed into android C-3PO's skin for Episode II, it was the same constricting, suffocating shell he'd first worn more then 20 years ago.
"I would look at Hayden [Christensen, who plays Anakin Skywalker] with his beautiful clothes, and think, "I want his role;" Daniels admits, in a familiar woebegone British accent. Even R2-D2 got an overhaul, "and if 3PO realizes that, he's going to be very, very hurt. He's suffered enough."
C-3PO seems to be made to suffer. That's his lot in life. And Daniels' lot, much to his suprise, is to play the most put-upon, persnickety cyborg ever to grace the screen. During the original 1977 film, "I'm saying, 'Hello, I am C-3-P-O', and thinking it was just rubbish, silly. I didn't think it would work at all," he says. "I was proved so wrong."
Just how wrong he was became apparent when Daniels found himself returning, four films later, to the same set in the Tunisian desert that kicked off the first Star Wars. This time around, we'll meet Luke Skywalker's future foster parents, Owen Lars and Beru Whitesun, and learn a little about what pushed Anakin Skywalker to become the evil Darth Vader.
"I also get to do something I've always wanted to do, something you've never seen C-3PO do before....," Daniels says, before he's cut off by a representative from Lucasfilm. "I can't tell?" the actor laments. "Let's just say it's out of charecter...but it becomes his charecter."
Daniels does let slip that 3PO gets his skin in this episode, though it looks more ramshackle than in later chapters, with silver and gold junkyard parts. In The Phantom Menace and early parts of Attack of the Clones, C-3PO is an animatronic creation operated by Daniels and other puppeteers. For those early scenes, the gangly android was attached to the front of Daniels' body, mimicking his movements, and Daniels was later erased, "like some awful Russian way of redefining history."
Fans can also look forward to a scene in which C-3PO is somehow maimed or decapitated, a feature of almost every Star Wars movie.
"George [Lucas] is a decent person, but he has a strange predilection for dismantling C-3PO," Daniels says. "It's like pulling the wings off flies. He does it every chance he can."
Though Daniels considers this "slightly cruel," he understands what makes it a series mainstay. "3PO has no sense of humor- that's like his main source of comic potential." he says.
As one of the only actors to appear in every Star Wars movie, Daniels has made peace with the fact that C-3PO is his signiture role, even if he's still trying to figure out the plot line. When Lucas told him he was constructed by Anakin, "I thought, "How lovely, because Alec Guinness was so kind to me on Star Wars, it was great to be created by his charecter."
Of course, Guinness played Obi-Wan Kenobi, "and Anakin is the other one," Daniels says, sighing deeply. "I only just figured out making this one, that, oh, Amidala is going to be {Princess Leia's] mom."
While he may not know as much as the fans do, Daniels does have moments that make all the suffering in the suit worthwhile. "Parents come up to me with their kid, and they look at [me] with such disintrest. And [I] tell them to close their eyes and..."- at this point he breaks into C-3PO, a deeper, more polite British voice than Daniels' own- "...and their faces just light up. I cannot tell you the joy that gives me."