Ewan McGregor, Hayden Christensen & Moses Ingram Answer 7 Star Wars Questions | Vanity Fair

well i don't i don't know if i'm getting into spoiler territory here can i can i say anything that possibly gets into spoiler territory here [Music] i'm eu mcgregor my name is hayden christensen my name is moses ingram i play anakin skywalker i play riva savander and i play the part of obi-wan kenobi [Music] jedi knight never a jedi master turned darth vader lord of the sith i am an inquisitor i would call myself the inquisitor actually a very complex character he has a strong sort of desire for power fear is fiercely intelligent and very quick on her feet someone who is always listening and intent on doing what she thinks is right even if no one else agrees with what it is that she's doing there's also a lot of inner conflict uh and there's there's certainly a an inner sort of struggle of identity i was living in vancouver at the time i was renting an apartment with a good friend of mine he knew that i was up for this role and i was i was going to be finding out soon i got the phone call when i was still in bed actually i remember coming out of the room just like an ear to ear grin on my face and my roommate looked at me and was like is that you know is that smile why you know what i think it is and then so i i lit up an imaginary lightsaber you know and immediately he got it and then he ran over to his record player and he had a star wars soundtrack and he put the star wars soundtrack on and then he lit up his imaginary lightsaber and we had a whole lightsaber battle as we were laughing and jumping all over the couch and apartment and it was it was a very exciting time for me yeah it was amazing time i mean i i've been working with danny boyle and i did a film with green away and i'd done a certain amount of work in britain and i very much felt like i was in a moment in british cinema and and star wars was definitely in a different lane i did a lot of thinking about it a lot of research a lot of speaking to people i knew and uh trusted about their opinion about it whether it was the right thing to do or not and then the closer i got to being cast as obi-wan i the more i wanted to do it you know i was such a great fan of the original films as a child and i felt like i just wanted to be part of that if i could be part of that then i would want to do that i don't think i said anything actually it was like one intense really long week of auditioning and then we got to that final zoom and i thought i was going to have to do something else and depth told me i had the job and honestly i think i probably was like okay thanks i think that's how it went by the time i actually heard about it i was stoked you know it was a it was a great experience it was different from anything i'd done in terms of its scale i got to work with liam neeson and ahmed best and natalie portman and i had a great experience you know making those films on the original films it was the technology the fact that we did so much of the filming on blue screen and green screen there were certain challenges with that the fact that there was so little of the environment there in episode two for instance i spent a lot of time with some tall alien people who weren't really there so that that was challenging as for an actor to make that all realistic well this one required a lot more athleticism than anything else we did about four months of training before we ever even hit the stage to start acting and so it just took a lot to pull everything together in that way i always had a tough time not making the lightsaber sound effects when i was when i was doing my lightsaber scenes just because you're you're sort of it's like muscle memory from being a kid i always have the the acting challenge of like playing a younger alec guinness and that's my great joy in doing this is to feel like i'm moving towards becoming alec guinness you know that's always what i'm trying to do well uh it's difficult to pinpoint a favorite scene some of them are so long ago oh it's really hard to pick just one there were a number of scenes that were very memorable working with hayden again was a great pleasure to be coming back with him after so long since we you know 17 years after we finished episode three was uh was great the first scene that we shot on the very first day it was stepping off of our ship and i remember thinking to myself oh my god this is this is huge and they were like air cannons and so many people and i think my first thought was don't don't mess this up don't mess this up at the end of episode three when the darth vader helmet comes down and he's officially encapsulated in the suit that for me was was a very big moment and i remember that very well our costume designer sudarat did such an amazing job building that costume it sort of just lends itself to making you stand in a certain way i felt bold and i felt strong and i felt like the leader that reba is at the time it felt like sort of completion for for my journey with the character you know i was playing anakin and then when he becomes darth vader that's sort of right um but now i've gotten to come back and continue my journey with the character but at the time it signified that my my job was done uh little did i know [Music] probably the biggest thing is that it already has millions of fans and i think the thing that's daunting is that whether people like it or not i'm absolutely gonna hear about it and that's scary i don't know that it's it's changed my view of star wars in this character as much as as it's just sort of further informed the story and these characters and that was kind of what was was really appealing about it for me was that we were given the opportunity to to sort of flush these characters out just a little bit more it's also super exciting to be joining a project in which i don't have the same things to live up to as ewing and hayden do i am coming in as somebody who's never been here before and so nobody is looking for me to be something specific and i sort of have free reign to be who i think riva is getting to come back and play darth vader and this sort of the notion that we were going to get a glimpse into the experience of being darth vader i thought that had a tremendous amount of value so it's really just been about further informing these characters i felt has been sort of very satisfying you know i wasn't a big fan of star wars before this i knew like the cultural pinpoints like vader luke i am your father obi-wan those things but i think what i've appreciated is the depth of the world that george lucas built and the escapism it provides so many people and provides myself now i've been very very happy to join the universe volume is just an amazing bit of technology the approach to working in the volume is much different than filming in front of a blue screen or a green screen i never had to pretend or imagine where i was you and hayden sort of were used to like green screens and tennis balls i feel really blessed that i could just walk in and be in whatever environment i was in you're totally surrounded by it and it's incredible you step into the volume and you're in star wars you can never really see sort of where it ends because it's so vast i think that was probably one of my favorite things about working on the series it's quite the experience if i could be one star wars creature who would be well i'd like to meet jar jar again i guess i'm gonna go with yoda just to see if i could get some of his wisdom maybe some of his knowledge might rub off on me i loved working with ahmed best who played jar jar binks maybe we could bring him back

Channel: Vanity Fair

Views: 1,273,300

Keywords: ewan mcgregor, ewan mcgregor interview, ewan mcgregor star wars, ewan mcgregor vanity fair, hayden christensen, hayden christensen interview, hayden christensen star wars, moses ingram, moses ingram interview, moses ingram star wars, obi wan kenobi, obi-wan kenobi, obi-wan kenobi star wars, star wars, star wars 2022, star wars behind the scenes, star wars interview, star wars obi-wan kenobi, star wars vanity fair, vanity fair, vanity fair star wars

Id: kWpCRYBq6kM

Length: 8min 3sec (483 seconds)

Published: Wed May 18 2022

Reddit Comments

[u/19sibly73]

Love the little tidbit at the end, “maybe we could bring [ahmed best] back.” Let’s hope Ahmed gets to come back and experience the love that Hayden’s seen as of late.

[u/DukeRodah98]

Ewan hoping for Ahmed Best to come back is so wholesome.

[u/DarthDuran22]

Not just Jar Jar. Bring Kelleran too. It’d be so cool to see Jedi Beq in a future series. I think a more serious role could be really cool for Best to show off on.

I also find it funny how at one point fans were clamoring to get Mark back in the 90’s when he was in his 40’s. Instead we got NJO with Older Luke artwork, but now here we are and we kinda got a parallel now with the father(Hayden) being brought back in his 40’s to resurrect that fun of his own trilogy that inspired so many kids. Love it.

[u/MostlyRocketScience]

As far as I know this is the first mention of Third Sisters full name: Reva Sevander (last name spelling according to the subtitles, but they also spelled the first name wrong). Wokieepedia doesn't even have the last name as of now: https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Third_Sister

[u/SageMerric]

So her full name is Reva Sevander(?), cool

[u/orange_jooze]

Interesting how Hayden says he's playing Anakin Skywalker, not Darth Vader.

[u/anomaly_xb-6783746]

I genuinely think Jar Jar could be well-received in this day and age if they brought him back. A lot of recent Star Wars and Marvel outings have in some part revitalized older, forgotten-about, less-well-received characters. If Jar Jar appeared in this era, between III and IV, he'd be like Obi-Wan: older, sadder, and jaded by the war. It'd be a stark contrast to the Jar Jar of TPM and I think it could do a lot for the character (and for Ahmed).

[u/Personal-Dress-761]

There’s more of a Canadian accent in Hayden’s natural speaking voice than when he plays Anakin. Another one of the subtleties in his performance.

[u/goldendreamseeker]

Moses seems really cool. Looking forward to her character!