Mark Hamill | Full Q&A | Oxford Union

awesome oh my gosh people are armed with lightsabers for the surprise well that is surprise some judging from that this is your first time in front of a big crowd haha well you know I got a little confused and we had that little cocktail reception and gradually people came and sat down and we started doing questions and answers and I thought oh gosh this is an intimate group this is quite manageable I thought that was the actual event so hopefully I haven't run out of clever anecdotes because I only have a few but it's a bit different in here that it is um so I thought I'd let the audience ask the questions because normally I sort of like do a little quick by graphical sketch of mine on the middle of 7 children my father was in the Navy so he we moved I went to 9 schools in 12 years which is a real sort of schizophrenic experience because once you get settled in one school it's always coast to coast you'd be in San Diego and finally find your niche and wall up you get transferred to New York where the sensibilities are completely different and hey look here comes surfer Joe you know you'd have to change your clothing and your attitude and your your thought process because you know your goal at that age anyways just to fit in and hopefully get a avoid being beaten up on a regular basis so but there that's good enough so now you know why I'm the way I am so as usual we'll start off I'll ask a few questions on my trip before opening up to the audience for some of your own questions it's theater-in-the-round oh and you got terrible seats unless there's mirrors over there I'm Moss Austin how does it compare to Cambridge now many points out the room oh that's the date school that dare not speak its name I thought I was you know I did some research you know and I thought I'd be very clever and learned some points and I thank them for inviting me to a school of such stature I said to be quite honest with you I would have had to improve myself academically even to qualify for a wooden spoon and the reaction was very much like yours just complete silence and I said my god I thought this was going to be a huge laugh line because when I would did my research now they haven't given an out since 1909 but it the wooden spoon was given to the student with the lowest passing grades of any given school year and I thought gee all that work I mean I went all I went to the trailer I went to the I went to the trouble of reading your Wikipedia page on the car ride over the least you can do is respond so but I you know I have to tell you I didn't talk about how lowbrow I am the first time I became aware of Oxford was Laurel and Hardy in a chump at Oxford but to be fair you know no comedians have ever made a movie about Cambridge as far as I know and when they refer to you as Oxbridge you guys get top billing so well done this school apparently is ought 392 years older than the discovery of America and I live in Los Angeles where people will point out Taco Bell's and say that buildings nearly 48 years old like you're going to be impressed I have all underwear older than that well I can save you say that this is going to be easy because I haven't even asked a question yet so that is fantastic thank you so you've said before that you were slightly frustrated at the end of Star Wars Episode six because we didn't really get to see Luke as a Jedi properly and then now we're at f7 well who here hasn't seen episode seven put your hand up seriously okay because you know I wouldn't have you ejected by any means but well I always thought you know at the end of Jedi I said well it's almost like the story of how James Bond got his license to kill and then they end the stories you don't see him become an agent but you know it had a beginning a middle and then I understood that that was the the structure of it all but you know I before I came over here there there was a guy that asked me the question of how much jour he said I was on Blue Peter and that I had back in the day and I was discussing the prequels how much did I know about the prequels listen now I'm asking myself questions the only reason I did that is because I started to answer and then we had to stop and do photographs and I never got the to answer that question it is interesting because it was in we went to North Africa on the first film and in some downtime George was and I were at some free time and I said why are we doing episode 4 you know why why start an episode why aren't we doing episode 1 and he's evolving on there they're supposed to be like the old Flash Gordon serials and you know serial chapter plays were even before my time and that would be like a 20 minute you know serialized story that you go to the movies you'd see the feature film you'd see some cartoons you'd see a newsreel and you'd see a chapter play use a little bit a cliffhanger ending you know the you know the cargo sailing off the cliff you do it certain death and then it would stop and they say you know next week you know episode 12 so that was his intent is to to you know mimic the the Flash Gordon serials and he thought if I call it episode 4 will have that preamble that you know that scrolling that is filling you in much like the original serials did you know last week and you know flash and Dale and the clutches of Ming the Merciless and you know he said I wanted to give the audience the feeling that they'd missed something and that they were coming into the middle of this story so uh and you know he he would say really profound things that later I think boy that that's that's so perceptive of him I mean I remember I wanted to go in on the day they were filming Darth Vader's arrival onto this onto the spacecraft when you first see him you know because they were going to blow a hole in the door he's going to come through the door and everything and I said to George you know in the script aren't you going to cut to two characters saying who is that that's the Dark Lord of the Sith and he's that you know some exposition and George just casually said ya know he's all dressed in black and we'll play some scary music don't know he's the bad guy so really he's all dressed in black we'll play some scary music they'll know he's the bad guy brilliant you know I I was looking at it as much more analytically thinking well they've got to be some dialog to say who this guy is but I did that on when peter cushing work to because I thought I'll never get to meet Peter Cushing because I don't have any scenes with him so I will made sure I went in and and got to to work with Peter hoop Oh parenthetically I should add I did my research with him and this is before the Internet we actually had to go to the library and read books and he was really surprised that I knew that one of his first movie parts was in a chump at Oxford so my dear boy how did you know that I said well you know and and he he but first of all he was thrilled that I knew more than his Hammer Films is it seems you know every time you need an actor you know because when I met Christopher Lee I was working on something that he was in and I kept saying to myself don't ask him about Dracula don't ask him about Jacqueline don't ask him about Dracula and so what did I do I asked him about Dracula I remember he said you know my dear boy that I played the road of Mustapha knees in an operatic production in balloon I forget where and I felt you know terrible because I mean really he was an actor of incredible range and you know I more than anyone should know what it's like to be so associated with one role but you know coming from the standpoint of never expecting you to be remembered for anything it's it's you'd have to be a very cynical person to not understand the kind of joy that this brings to people I mean some people don't really care they either don't like it or they like it to a level where they see the movie and then they go on and they move it on and then there's people that really like it and want to see it two or three times and then there's what I call the you PFS the ultra passionate fans and there are the people that see the movies and they read the books and they they they play the video games and they read the comic books and they read the role-playing games and they they know way more about the films than I do at this point because I was totally into it when we were making the films I really wanted to know everything about everything but once the films over it's over and you have to you know sort of flush the memory banks so that you can have more memory space to remember other things I remember when I was on a soap opera it wasn't so much learning the dialogue that was relentless and it was all exposition those you know it's like Coronation Street or one of those and it was always exposition I get these phone calls say what no I didn't know what was she arrested for did she know that Billy was embezzling his money you would just go to these ridiculous conversations where you're keeping people caught up with what happened Monday through Wednesday and it wasn't so hard learning the new dialogue it was trying to forget it so you could remember new dialogue because people would trigger you into dialogue and you oh my god I'm saying a speech from three weeks ago because it was also similar so in many ways that's why I forgotten a lot about Star Wars I took of Star Wars trivia quiz and did horribly honor you know what was Han Solo smuggling on the Millennium Falcon I think was multiple choice and I still failed I I thought it was jewelry I guess it's spices but like I say in the fact that they've become so generational I mean because they're said in a galaxy far far away there aren't there's not clothing that dates you or like vehicles that are associated with a certain year or hairstyles I mean these six seven year old kids they see these movies and think we made them last week and the parents get very excited so you know that is the Skywalker and the see this six-year-old has this ghastly expression on his face like what happened to this guy I try and relax relax just tell them I'm Luke's grandfather so we don't alarm the children but but I think they're very much like the Disney animated films in the sense that their generational so you know you like them as a kid you get older you show your kid brother and sister the older still and you have children of your own you show their them and it's it's something that you can share with the whole family that was fantastic and I'm just getting warmed up hi everyone let make sure you got a quick look but I was just about set Maryna back in okay so to have started which is then you've said before that your frustration of Star Wars ended with not seeing Luke as a Jedi properly and then in Episode seven we still don't really see that and even you know I know you can't really talk about happens in the next two films but we seem to missed this great period of Luke's life is that not frustrating for you well you can get a lot of where they're going from Episode seven in the sense that it's really about a new generation of heroes and villains and that we're relegated more to the roles that say Sir Alec or or Peter Cushing or any of the other subsidiary characters play it's not my story anymore we added to getting a middle and an end now what's interesting is that there's so much back history that Luke has gone through even if they're not going to tell it in the story it's it proper I have to know for myself what I've been up to and so there's been a lot of discussion with Rian Johnson who's the new writer and director of eight it's really with seven you know he had a lot on his plate he had to establish a whole new world a whole new conflict all these new characters we since Han Solo was going to meet a certain fate there's nobody here that hasn't seen it all right if you haven't seen it put your hand on that well I won't I still write me I'm programmed I mean they're pathologically secretive now about I mean you can't even walk from your trailer to the soundstage without what they call secrecy cloaks there are these big robes with hoods over sounds like a Jedi robe it's very much like that but I said come on we're at Pinewood I mean you're really protected in this spaces oh no drones really drones and you know the other day I saw domhnall gleeson you know and he was talking I said I did I just you come in from the into the soundstage with a security robe on he said yeah I think you're wearing the same outfit you did in episode 7 what's the secret now I think a few people saw it but it's just part of the fun I guess now back in the day no one really cared especially on the original Star Wars nobody cared by Empire Strikes Back there were there was an helicopter that was hired to fly over and when we in Finn's the Norway shooting the snow sequences and these they bribed a couple of pilots that were meant to be out looking for some lost skiers - buzz bomb our our set and it appeared in the English newspapers I loved it because they got photographs of like you know transport equipment you know traditional what do you call them snow machines or snowmobiles with clearly the logo the modern-day logo of whatever company manufactured and that the the caption under the photograph was strange alien vehicles populate the world and the new Star Wars film you know it was pretty funny they didn't get to see much but it was kind of exciting I thought wow now people actually really care in fact I told this before but when we were shooting that climactic scene with my confrontation with Darth Vader Irvin Kershner the director pulled me aside one day he said I'm going to tell you something now I know it George knows it and when I tell you you'll know it and the reason I'm putting it to you this way is that if it leaks we'll know it was you you know I'm thinking what what what is it because the original scene was you know he's doing the dialogue about join me and together we could rule the universe get it together you know obi-wan never told you the full story or whatever it was I'm paraphrasing of course and I you know I say he told me enough he told me you killed my father and in the script that was printed for the crew and for David Prowse who was playing Darth Vader the climactic twist was you don't know the truth obi-wan and killed your father and it was just as you see in the movie I go know and it's and when you think of it it's a pretty good twist if you know that were the but he said what we're going to do is we're going to record that and then we're going to put in the line and I was just stunned I said really oh my god I can't believe it what a great great twist I had to keep it a secret for you know like I don't know however between filming it and it coming out the first time it was screened at Harrison turning to music you never told me that I said I saw I said I was I was afraid to tell anybody because because of you know the consequences would have been so extreme and what was interesting about it was by this time now we filmed it at Boram would Elstree Studios and at lunchtime a lot of the background artists would go down to the pub to have lunch and a pint and there were people from some of the tabloid newspapers with 50-pound note saying you know if you get you know give me something give me something give me something so not long after we filmed it in the newspaper and it wasn't even a headline it was a little box it says Alec Guinness head baddie in Star Wars - meaning that someone had overheard him delivering that line over the wind machines and by the way 90% of those movies are dubbed after the fact because the sound is never good there's wind machines if Threepio is in a scene his clanking has to be it it ruins the sound they have to strip out all the sound and you have to build it from scratch which is really difficult because if you think the dialogues hard to deliver you know in its original incarnation to add another layer of artifice on top of that is even more difficult as Harrison once said you can type this mmm you just can't say it but I was delighted because I thought wow they leaked fake information which is pretty pretty funny when you think about it but we weren't just we weren't used to being scrutinized that closely and you mentioned how the new trilogy it's not your story anymore it's about new sets of Heroes new sets of villains and have you found that in terms of from enacting and mentoring perspective and you guiding the new axes in it Daisy Ridley John boyega both on screen and off screen of what it means to be a part of Star Wars there's no way you can really describe it to them I thought well first of all I went to the table read and I was just knocked out and how good these are not kids but how the new I thought they were just wonderful if anything I should be asking them for advice but in terms of how your life is going to change and I mean I'm sure they had an inkling because I mean there was something to base it upon we discovered it as it happened Harrison Kari and I went out on a promotional tour before the movie open only liked it opened while we were on the tour and we were I think flying from somewhere in Canada to Chicago we landed in Chicago and there were all these people at the airport and I said to them oh boy there must be somebody famous on the plane we're looking around like for like who's on the plane maybe you know the Teddy Kennedy or some rock star something like that and as we taxied in I went hey Carrie look there's somebody dressed like you with the cinnamon rolls on their head and look there's a guy with a vest like you arason oh my god they're dressed up like the characters from the movie we couldn't believe it you know we just we just couldn't believe it that that it had caught on like this because we were sort of like in a bubble where you you go from a car to a studio to the hotel room to a recording studio and into a car and then back to the airport and you're sort of you don't get out in and see this stuff you know you certainly don't get to go to the theater and see how it's going down the very first day that they opened it in Los Angeles I was scheduled to - those were the 70 millimeter prints and they were still dubbing the 35 millimeter prints to release a few weeks down the road when I went wide as they say because it was just in select theaters so I said to the driver can you go by Grauman's Chinese guard want to see where the movies playing one of the big controversies was that Fox there was this big Rao back and forth of how to promote it I mean what the hell is this thing you know some of the ad campaigns decided to take it very seriously a you know an entertainment voyage beyond your imagination far beyond and the other said let's make it more like a rollicking comedy like the little route tools in outer space you know bumping heads and and you know accentuate the more goofy side of it but they couldn't really figure this out so you know they missed all the the dates and they had to release the film with no poster whatsoever they just stapled photo you know stills from the movie lobby cards they call them the color the big ones but there was no poster and I don't remember ever seeing any advertising on on television like usually on Saturday Night Live which started in 75 they whatever movies that were coming out would get a slot and you'd know what was happening I remember seeing any advertising carry and I went when we heard that the trailer was playing in Westwood and we went to the box office and said they didn't who we were we just said we're two actors that are in this movie star wars that you're showing the trailer for we were wondering can we just go in and watch the trailer and you know and then we'll come right back out you know instead of paying the price and you know seeing the movie and for some reason I don't know this move that ever happened again they said okay sure so we went in and watched the is the first footage we'd ever seen I mean I went there were dubbing sessions again that we'd seen bits and pieces of it but we'd never seen it cut together and they didn't have John Williams score and there were very few effects finished but I do remember there because there's always somebody you know that shouts out funny comments you know when you go to the movie theater and sometimes they really score you know what I'm saying and sometimes they fall flat but this guy I'm telling you it was so funny because at the end of the trailer it was it was the it they started like there's this pulsing boom boom boom boom and the voice was somewhere in space it could all be happening cut you they're coming in too fast Amy you know and they were they would cut to all this chaos and then back to the boom-boom boom boom with the slow and so they're alternating between just you know explosion of action back to the narration and and and the narration continued towards the end it was only sixty seconds or something a billion light years in the making boom boom boom and it's coming to your galaxy next summer and there was a big explosion and it's at Star Wars and as soon as the narrator said and it's coming to your galaxy next summer somebody the balcony yell yeah and it's coming to the Late Show about a week and a half after that the Late Show meaning television because it looks so terrible that it would be a complete flop and it would be on don't see it in the theaters you know wait a week and half will be on TV I thought it was funny anyway because you couldn't really tell anything front from it but anyway well so I'm going to to dub the thirty five-millimeter prints that God brings from the past Grauman's theater and I just couldn't believe my eyes there were lines around the block cuz I said if anything that'll it'll have a build up it'll be it'll be a word-of-mouth hit people will talk about it and say you have you seen this thing you got to see it cuz we've all said to me did you expect it to be so successful well of course I didn't expect it the extent of it but I said I did think it would be a hit because we were signed for one film and the contingency was if it made a certain amount of money if it was successful we were obligated to do part two in part three and I said to my friend I said I'm telling you it's got humour women don't normally like science fiction but it's got a strong female character it's funny as hell there's banter there's sexual tension there's that we got one of the greatest actors in the english-speaking world the Academy award-winning Sir Alec Guinness right next to an eight-foot guy in a monkey costume flying a spaceship what's not to like it's got everything I loved it I said really I said it's so clearly too me anyway a fairy tale if you know it's got a farm boy it's got a wizard it's got a princess it's got a pirate it read like a mash-up of so many other movies I've seen before little wizard of oz a little the dam Busters world war two movies western films pirate films I mean there were so many different cinematic references that everything old is new again and by using so many recognizable cinematic moments it sort of transmogrifies into something that seemingly original in and of itself so I thought it would be popular enough to I said wait a second it cost nine and a half million dollars can you believe that that's like the catering bill on a Marvel film these days I mean that's nothing I mean you get two big stars they each get nine million dollars just to be in the movie and that's not even the biggest stars right so anyway but I said okay but rule of thumb is two and a half times so eighteen plus four and a half okay I think this thing is going to make easy will make 30 million and I said even it flops at the box office word-of-mouth is such that it's got to become a cult film there'll be so many pot-smoking college kids that want to go see this at midnight right after the Rocky Horror Picture Show because it's goofy as all get-out I mean it's like there's nothing quite like it it might misfire big-time and I certainly never thought we'd be taken seriously by the mainstream media what we never believed we'd be on the cover of Time magazine maybe some kiddie magazine or something like that or you know Famous Monsters or some science thickness in the Fantastic or whatever the the loot magazines at the time were but never did we think that it would have that kind of mainstream success but I think it would be a hit but I couldn't figure out how it from the very first day one of the things was in those days May 25th was jumping ahead of the queue in the sense that the big movies didn't come out until the first week that school was out in June and bye-bye you know releasing it a week or two before the traditional date we had a head start we had 7 to 14 days to try and get some attention before the other movies came out now of course everyone's followed that model to the point where it gets earlier and earlier every year you know May 25th was the traditional release date of the originals JJ couldn't get ready for they wanted to be May 25th the same date and he said I can't do it in time what by releasing it at Christmas it was such a great success now all of them were going to come out at Christmas time you're doing so well you wipes out quite a lot of my questions so I'll then I'll end with a few short questions from me and then we'll open it up to the floor now I completely understand you can't give any spoilers but when you went to the first table read did you look at Daisy Ridley and thought think she looks like me no you clever minx I think it might become disoriented and start spilling spoilers left and right first of all when I read I said wait a second why am I going to fly 6,000 miles for a table listen you know come on uh you know call me Luke cliffhanger but I said oh I get it because I mean if I don't show up to the table read that'll become a story in and of itself I better show up right and every person had a specific place to sit it's not like we just wandered in and just sat down you sit here you sit here you sit here you sit here so forth so I was across from Harrison and Harry and Daisy was right in between that and I thought see now they start reading things into it because when they saw the photograph they said well she's got to be the daughter of Han and Leia because look at where she's sitting and I was sitting next to Anthony Daniels who's c-3po but what was the question I also if you thought the days of Ridley looked like you in some small way well no I didn't really that didn't really enter into it I mean I'd read the script by that point and it's clear that they don't really want you to know what her background is or where she came from I thought saw the parallels I thought well she's living in the desert sort of aimlessly and you know I saw the parallels with my character and so forth but and and heritage is so important in the Star Wars films you know I mean we didn't realize at the time you know the whole thing that Vader's the father and so forth and you know when returned the Jedi came along because George you know always made it seem like he had all of these mapped out in his head and then when I read that the that that Leia and I were long separated twins I said hey no wait a minute is he trying to top Vader is that he's dad Vader I mean come on because I thought if anything let's go for let's go for broke let's have them unmask Boba Fett and it's my long-lost mother you know who's working for the resistance as a double agent let's I mean it's hard to top Vader's the father I mean that's the all-time you know twist ending of them all but you know so we sort of thought did he tack that on I mean we couldn't really figure that out and I do remember at one point when we were rehearsing a scene up in the dressing room with Kirsch and I said well wait a second so she's my sister Princess Leia does does that mean that Luke is royalty too and Carrie what no okay just asking but it really made me laugh to think how you know she really at that point first of all she loved being the only girl in the movie who stark was in it but she was cut out I mean there were some female characters that were authority figures and so but the only real character that had any story and of course she loved being a princess who wouldn't come on but again it surprised me it took I was taken aback at how adamant she was that no you're a farm boy talk about getting the you know short end of the stick my daughter was just staying on the ride over you know she's you know she's raised in the lap of luxury and eating foie gras and you know drinking fine wine and I'm out you know working on a rusty moisture vaporators sort of there but you know it is what it is but no I didn't think so much that I just thought Daisy was incredible she's so genuine so appealing you know uh you know she's just lovable it's it's she and she's just luminous I mean she just beams she's just got a wonderful wonderful charisma about her and I just adore her you know she's roughly my daughter's age and that's how I relate to her even though wait a minute oh I knew all you Smarties would drag it out of me now I I I don't mean anything by that I mean as actors that's how I relate to her and but two final questions which I know everyone wants to ask and then we'll move it on to questions on it so the question on everyone's lips who would win in a fight one wookie or five Ewoks so interesting you say that because originally the concept was to go to a planet of wookies and they said from the from the budgetary point of view would be way too expensive to make all those costumes and the george said well let's just make really tiny let's make small wookies because the whole idea was he loved the idea of medieval technology taking down you know advanced technology with catapults and tripwires and all that sort of thing so that was the original impetus for for the for the Ewoks but the you know it's that little it's like if a tree falls in the forest does it make a sound you know it's one of those imponderables I think five I probably would I think the Ewoks could crawl all over you and get up in your face you know at least with a with a Wookiee you could try and avoid them if possible when we were kids this was very important to us we would rate the monsters you know we'd say you know if you could keep your wits about you I think you could outrun Frankenstein and his intellect as such he's very childlike you could probably distract him we know he's got a thing for fire so we make these notes Dracula now that's another story he's got the hit hypnotic eyes he can take over your will you know look into my eyes look deeply that would be scary The Wolfman forget about it he would even rip you off I mean it's come on you have no chance with the everyone said of all the monsters the easiest one to face the mummy he's dragging the leg he's only got one good arm if you can keep your wits about you usually what happens though people get so flustered they fall they fall and the mummy overtakes them and breaks their neck but these were all important question to us is he kids and now there's new the new version our Star Wars questions like that that are unanswerable but if I had to choose I'd say I take the wiki one Wookiee over five e works especially since the Ewoks are carnivorous weren't they trying to eat us in Return of the Jedi I think we were on bigots getting or in a big net they were going to make they were in a barbecue s they thought our our Threepio was a golden god I mean come on it was a culture we totally did not understand and the final question tying in two of your most famous characters who would win in a fight the Joker or Luke Skywalker ah oh gosh there's such a wonderful feeling to play characters they're so diametrically opposed when one hand you have this icon of virtue and who's kindly and you know and then you have this psychopath who's takes such delight and you know finds cruelty and perversity delicious it's it's wonderful young kids you know you find it very disturbing when they finally make the connect I've done about four or five year old you know when they when they realize that I'm the joke or two it's it's very unsettling to them but let's see I'd have to I don't know one because Luke has powers I did the Joker doesn't have but again I've never really thought about this well maybe help you not to ask to leading a question but what would the preamble to a battle between the two of them sound like so you dare face me facial I'm ready to rip your face off uh you know you know kids kids will come up to you and say do the Joker do the Joker do the Joker and you know you can't do the Joker subtly in first of all I don't want to ruin the illusion or we say either turn turn your back or close your eyes and kids are so trusting you know if I told you to close your eyes you say what are you trying to pull you're gonna lift my wallet but kids immediately do it you know and then Joker and the trouble is you have to really let it rip you know so you'll be in Toys R Us you know on Iowa and people getting worried or what's that middle-aged man doing that child costing that child on Aisle five but yeah I've had so much pleasure doing not just the Joker but so many character parts you would never get on camera because of your limitations of how you look that's one of the things that's so liberating about voiceover you don't have to consider you make choices that you would never make on camera because nobody can see you it's wonderful and the only time I get to use dialects either when I was in New York doing plays or or in animation and I didn't really do animation until the Joker and it just opened up a whole new world for me I thought oh my god this is just a dream come true I was saying earlier it's the ultimate lazy actor's dream you don't have to memorize your lines you read them all you they don't care how you look you can come in looking like hell you don't have to shave you don't have to have nice clothes it's it's just wonderful I mean there was a sequence I remember where we're I have a fistfight with Batman in a helicopter with crashes into a casino and slides across the floor and I was saying to Kevin Conroy can you imagine we were doing this live action with the miniatures and the stunt rehearsals and the stunt doubles and you know it would take six weeks for sure and you know we did the whole episode in four hours yep you just got oh you know all that stuff and they they put all the special effects in or the sound effects later it's just fantastic I just love it because we are all too young to have experienced the Golden Age of Radio and you know voiceover for cartoons is the next best thing because it's all in your imagination it's it's it's almost like the feeling you get when you turn the lights out and you have to tell your kids a bedtime story well it's all in their minds because when you do that when you do the soundtrack it's before the animation is done usually do the voice tracks first and then they animate to your voice later and we you know I love the voice-over community that that some of the best actors I've ever worked with are in voiceovers and they're incredible I mean you know that you have the five actors sitting there bored and each one of them are can do 50 different impressions I mean not that they don't sound sort of like Orson Welles Maurice LaMarche becomes Orson Welles he was the brain on pinky in the brain in fact he dubbed Orson Welles in the in the Tim Burton movie version of what's it called Nathan what is it Ed Wood it's my son Nathan made your hand Nathan say hi right next right next to Nathan is the baby the family Chelsea Elizabeth hand up please all the way up that's my wife Mary Lou I should say my first wife Mary Lou and the missing child is the middle child Griffin who couldn't get away because he's teaches martial arts in in Santa Monica and he has a class and you know you couldn't get away from he's going to come over at some point but anyway so you're seeing with these people and I'm telling you it's so entertaining because they back and forth I mean it's sometimes I think we should pay them to go to recording sessions for animation because it's so entertaining because you're sitting with Amit amongst these people that come out of stand up and improv and and just brilliantly funny people and brilliantly talented people a lot of people will come up to me and say you know listen I do the Joker too and sometimes they do great and they said you know I can do funny voices can you get me into voiceover and you think well you know you don't want to embarrass them but you know but people don't understand is that it's not about doing funny voices these are really good actors now they're playing characters that are exaggerated and and and and you know sometimes do you you do sound very cartoony but it's not a matter of being able to make funny sounds and voices and I think a lot of times they don't get the credit that they're due because for some reason you know for I don't know I don't have a lot of people coming up and saying you know I should be on Broadway you know I do this and that or I should be in movies or whatever but lots of people say oh I can do cartoons listen you might even read Tipton get all that is good I like that but it's you've got to be dedicated you know it's not a matter of being able to do a good Homer Simpson and you're going to have a career it's hard work I go to drama classes all the time and I hate to be a buzzkill but I try and talk kids out of show business seriously I think if there's anything you like as much as performing even if you be get into it academically and become a drama teacher or if you if there's something else you like you could still do community theater you can do amateur theater you can still perform but I'm telling you if you get into it as a profession you're in for a lifetime of rejection and unemployment I mean you could have a you get seven or eight jobs and then you don't work for a year and a half you know you start running out of money you have to go drive a cab or wait tables or something it's a miserable profession believe me please don't do it and that's not just from the standpoint that you know obviously there's probably people in the audience more challenges than me that will be stealing my jobs if they succeed it's not that it's just the fact that it is it's only for the if you can't talk someone out of show business then they have a shot because my parents kept saying get a degree something to fall back on you know if it doesn't work out if it doesn't you know and I thought wow they're probably right now I went to college for two years four semesters and my you know my motivation was in those days if you didn't go right into college you get drafted into the Vietnam War and I'd wanted to play a soldier I didn't want to be a soldier but so that's by the way that's great motivation you know either higher learning or here's a gun go kill some people so I think that in a way I thought well if I had to do something else I guess I could be a teacher I do like people I love it's in many ways lawyers also teaching and lawyers you have a you have a captive audience they have to watch you even whether if they don't want to or not and there's a certain performance element in both those professions and I do I love young people I thought I should teach kids that before the whole hormones kick in I mean the teenage years I don't want to have to deal with that but if I could get grade school kids like say ten I should be like an elementary school teacher something like that and there were teachers that were really influential on on me that I've never forgotten to this day and I thought if I could be one of those teachers that really make a learning interesting and challenging and where you go oh boy can't wait to get to classes that oh no not him again that I could I could handle but there was also something that was really I love the lure the the danger of working without a net you know it's one thing to be a type-a tightrope walker if there's a net as opposed to being a tightrope walker where you could plummet to your death at any moment and that's the the disconnect between someone who's rational and someone who's just crazy enough to go into show business and stick to it no matter what and you see some of these actors you go how did that actor go through all of his 20s and 30s he's like a character actor who really only came into his own when he was 45 Bob Hoskins apparently didn't get into it until his 40s there's a long list of character actors like that but if you can't talk someone out of show business they probably have a pretty good chance of making it because sometimes I think tenacity is more almost more important than Talent it's equally as important for sure well thank you Mark we now have time for quite a few questions from the audience oh well okay so if you'd like to ask question please raise your hand ha yeah and a mic friend will come round to you which will amplify your voice if we can please go to the member here and I'll try and be as brief you know if I go on and on I want to drink it me as I can first of all I like your bid out it contractually obligated but proceed and second of all how did the casting process differ between Luke and Joker I mean other than the obvious well I heard that George Lucas I knew of American Graffiti was doing a movie that was basically a sci-fi fantasy of modeled on the Flash Gordon films when you went in you didn't get a script they just wanted to get a feel for who you were and I noticed there were guys that were sort of teenaged aged like me and there were middle aged more so they were looking at cons and Luke's I didn't after I passed that part where I just talked to George and all he was having auditions with Brian DePalma who was looking for actors for Carrie the horror film based on the Stephen King novel and once we went on and talked now I had Edition for American Graffiti but I never met George I didn't make it past his casting director Fred ruse came in did the same thing where he tell us a little bit about yourself and I wasn't right for anything in graffiti but after that I got a script in the in the scene in the mail and I memorized that and did a screen test on videotape with Arison again with very little knowledge I'd like I'd say I didn't read the whole script until I got the part with Joker I knew Batman since I was a kid I really I knew that it was going to be modeled on the Max Fleischer Superman cartoons which were really high quality that they were going to try and appeal to adults as well as children they were going to were going to do it like the previous incarnation so I said boy I'd love to be a part of that I'd love to play a villain but I'd like to play like two-face dr. Hugo Strange two-face I don't know somebody that's never been done before and that had her something that hadn't been done on the TV series and they gave me when they found out I wanted to be in it they gave me a part in heart advice which was the first mr. freeze episode and I was stunned at the script by Paul Dini I said my god this is so deep it's so melancholy and poignant it's clearly miles ahead of most of the cartoons that were being made at the time for children so I went in and of course I let my geek flag fly I mean I was all over the place in terms of my enthusiasm for Batman are you gonna do this character that carried her over but and they kind of remembered me later when they were casting the Joker because the original actor they changed their minds after they had done six episodes which were the hardest for me to do because I had to dub already finished animation with the Joker voice five seven episodes after six or so they were original episodes because then I could really relax and do my own cadence of my own timing but I went in there was just a black and white drawing of the Joker it said all it said was don't think Nicholson because they didn't want you to just imitate laid one jack cuz he'd already done it for the movie and you know he was brilliant uh and and so it really and you don't you in both these cases you're trying to get information is you know to try and and and fulfill their vision a lot of times they don't know until they hear it themselves you know when I was saying to Harrison I said hey is this like are we supposed to be making fun of this I mean come on I mean you know the scene that we're doing for George you know you'd work for them in graffiti I mean is this the parody or is it for real you know come on let's just just say the lines and let's get it done so I couldn't get anything out of anybody saying with Joker I thought well you know what one thing that gave me confidence is I said there's no way they're gonna cast the guy who plays Luke Skywalker to be this icon of villainy so I was really cocky in the sense that there I knew I couldn't get the part sometimes what tripped you up is that you want it so bad your nerves betray you and your timings off you're trying you're you over sell it or I don't know it's so it's hard to describe but one thing that I felt about Joker was since there's no way I can get this just from the standpoint of the publicity of saying you know because years after I did it people kept saying that Mark Hamill you know and they demand on the street do the voice that's not you is it ah but but I had the confidence of knowing that I couldn't get it so I said you know what I'm gonna go in there give him the best damn Joker they've ever heard heard and they're gonna really regret the fact that they can't hire me I was I had this arrogance when I did it which worked well for the part and I had a lot of laughs that I developed because I'd been doing Amadeus and and Mozart was described as having a ghastly laugh that was so in contrast to this celestial music that was coming out of him it just called Salieri that he braids like a donkey and when you're doing eight a week you know you can't change the words but you can play around with the laughs and I've been doing eight a week for like nine months or something I was up there in the four hundred performances and I was really getting crazed trying to keep it fresh every day so I went in there were quite an arsenal of laughs and later they told me that was the deciding factor was the laughs that that got it for me but like I say woods and I swing from great confidence and then 180 degrees when they called and said well you got a nice my agent is that got what they want you for the Joker's Oh No she can't do that happy Hill why not it's it's too high-profile nothing I do will match how people hear him I don't even believe that I'm terrible I can't play that part I told you I want to play to face or mad at her or something that no one ever heard before Cesar Romero has done it Jack Nicholson's son of Heath Ledger hadn't done it at that point but I just thought what did I get myself into it and of course your actor friends don't help at all like wow you're brave I said what do you mean well I wouldn't want to fall Jack Nicholson and anything oh my god and I couldn't remember what I done I'm dry now I know they have reference tapes they can play for you but I'm driving to the first recording of the Joker thinking we did how did I yeah you know of course in Los Angeles people laughing to themselves no one pays anything any money whatsoever you know because they're you know there's so many people untethered from reality but like I say I went from great confidence until a push came to shove and I had to do and I thought oh my god well what's the worst that's going to happen is I'm going to go I can't remember what I did I'm going to be terrible and they'll just replace me you know that's the easiest thing to do is to change avoids and animation right up into the last minute you can change pull somebody's voice out and dub somebody else in just weeks before you release it in the theatres you can't do that live action and remember when I told you I keep my answers short yeah yes oh that's all right thank you a question um can we please go to remember in the front row though hi um obviously you've been involved in a lot of truly great Batman works but what's the one Batman work that you weren't involved in that you wish had been involved in well you know I'm a great audience I love so many of the actors that have played Joker buddies of mine Jeff Bennett in braving the bold Kevin Michael Richardson in the Batman John DiMaggio who plays bender on on Futurama did it and under the Red Hood I don't might know my kléberson but I think he's wonderful in the Dark Knight it's a character like any great part that's meant to be interpreted by many different actors in many different ways and one of the things that I always tried to do with my Joker is imagine that you're playing it for the very first time because so many of those scripts in the original incarnation were different like one would be stark and pretty scary but it was for children there were standards and practices the censors you couldn't you could you couldn't kill as eight people would stride and say why don't you kill people you're a homicidal maniac well we couldn't do that it was a children's cartoon and then there would be episodes that would be light-hearted like a take-off on Thelma and Louise where Harley teams up with poison ivy and I'm you know puttering around the house in an apron and you know like I'm totally emasculated and I knew my role there was to be the comic relief in that episode but it was miles away from say master the phantasm each time you play it try and the same thing when you're doing eight a week you when you're on Broadway how am i dragging my rear'd I don't want to do it today I'm just and it's a matinee day I've got to I don't want to do it twice I don't want to do it once much less twice and it's freezing there's sleet going on she's in her footie pajamas she doesn't have to leave the house she's going to order take in oh I resent her horribly but then you get to the theater and you realize you've got a whole full house out there they've never seen it before it's like the very first time so even though you've done it over and over in you're bored with the story you have to be put yourself in the frame of mind of the audience and that's what I do with the Joker and the Joker in the animated at were the the Arkham games is as nasty and you know adult as can be so in contrast to those early cartoons we're now doing short cartoons that are aimed at a younger audience I forget what it's called Justice League action I've only done a handful of them but we're almost like a double act if Kevin is going to do Batman you know it's Laurel and Hardy if he's Batman I you know he's my guy he's my favorite he's one of the nicest guys in show business just one of the sweetest men in the world I adore him and we're like a double act because I mean when I don't play Joker then it's usually a different Batman that's just the way it is so I hope I answered your question but it's like a different role every single time thank you for your question can we please go to remember there and the glasses that hi um after the last Star Wars film was released a lot of people thought that there was a lot of chemistry between Poe and Finn and that maybe like they should be a couple do you think we will ever see a same-sex relationship in a Star Wars film yeah the question was do you think there should be a same set up do that we will see it well I just read online I don't know if it's true because I didn't hear Komarov is mouth the JJ is very much open to that idea you know I mean the Internet is very interesting experience for me because in the old days you get fan mail and you'd sign as much as you can until it gets so voluminous that you had to help help and so forth or form letters that you just signed you're saying a lot of times I would say you know I don't have time to specifically answer your letter but you know the signature is real etcetera etc but now it's like the the fans come right into your house and they ask you all these questions I'm getting bullied at school I'm afraid to come out because my parents are religious and they'll hate me and so forth it just breaks your heart and they would say to me you know you could Luke be gay and I would say you know it's meant to be interpreted by you if you think he's gay of course he's gay if you think he's straight that's off anything you want is real you shouldn't be ashamed of it you know judged Luke by his character not by who he loves it seems to me that the trauma of discovering that the only girl you had a big crush on is your sister that you know I mean I know it's all we all have a big laugh about that but from if you're in character that's a traumatic experience you know I mean and there's not in the original trilogy there weren't a lot of options she was about the only eligible young woman in the whole universe but so well I just I just do think that their their fantasies meant for children children of all ages of course but because they are that they aren't meant to address adult sexuality specifically but I was saying that it's a it's a it's a universe of acceptance and unification it's helping others less fortunate than yourself it's acts of selflessness of caring and sharing to me that should tell you that if we can accept characters of every kind of a human and alien what are the odds come on I mean yeah and I think the question is how specific do they want to get because for really young audiences they don't even understand you know they see their mommy and daddy smooching or whatever but you know you have to strike the proper balance but it's obviously a galaxy far far away that's filled with inclusive tendencies thank you for question but time for a few more questions can we please go to the let's give'em right at the back let's go there in the balloon yes right thank you thank you you may have already covered this um but the first Star Wars in the UK from what I understand was like a mini mutiny right everybody thought George Lucas was an idiot nobody wanted to be on the set the actors were incredibly critical some of them I'm just curious sort of to the extent you observed it kind of how you saw George the attitude towards the film the movie first making it with the first the first production and when the partners in the UK yeah yeah it was very badly so how did he kind of lead through that how did you lead through that and what was your I don't know what I have to tell you is that the the crew that was making edge they were all very professional but they all thought it was to kindly put kindly rubbish you know they thought it was silly I mean there's not a lot of things they can compare to Doctor Who maybe there's a comic strip called dan dare the idiom was not really something that was familiar to the British crew so they were really nice and they liked all of us but they just thought it was ridiculous they thought it would be a movie that would be released only in matinee for children in the daytime and I loved the British sense of humor we had a Kenny the boom guy you know you'd be doing this dialogue you know you know bite you know you know I want to go to Alderaan with you you know there are all these phrases that were unusual to their ears and you know it'd get picked up by the crew and you'd be walking along the hallway and you pass Kenny go older on we will go into old run mate all of us and you know and he'd always be there if you do this really difficult dialogue and you look up at Kenny holding the boom and he'd always give you the eye roll it was always and believe me there was a typo one day on one of the when they were trying to type obi-wan Kenobi and they add an eye where they shouldn't and it came out obi-wan key we didn't know what that meant but the crew never let us forget it I would be wine ki all right all right but no but they were very kind about it but I just thought you know you have to believe in what you're doing I thought it was good I asked a Sir Alec one time I said why would you want to do a movie like this I couldn't believe that we would were able to get an actor of his stature and he said that he always wanted him self playing a wizard in a film for children so and I think you noticed the influence because later when they did Superman they used that same predicate get a actor of such gravitas Marlon Brando and then you get away with casting a bunch of unknowns in the leading roles and that's what was your impression of George did you think you were working with a genius yeah I thought and I don't mean that in a mean way at all I I thought he was an incredibly gifted filmmaker I knew his work from from American Graffiti I thought the the script for Star Wars was fantastic it said by George Lucas I didn't know the glory and Willard Huyck had helped him with it they wrote a lot of the comical dialogue the banter because they had written American Graffiti and they were uncredited for it but I thought he was just an incredibly brilliant filmmaker genius is a word to describe like say Mozart who at age six could compose you know I mean sonatas and you know where people are so gifted it's beyond reason to be able to describe through any rational way how they're able to achieve that so I think genius is an overworked used word in in especially in Hollywood but I think he's second to none at doing the kind of thing he does better than anybody else so I had a deep deep respect for him there's no question about it thank you time for one final question so can we please go to your sister can you pick that guy yeah okay okay so the well go to the young woman with the glasses they're three rows back yep you just stand up thank you very much I love we out spend so much time picking the boobs gonna ask the question so I didn't realize how good accents you are um is that something that just came naturally always you worked it and do you have a favorite accent you like to do well you know like I say I mean we were talking earlier about the Joker I started out thinking I should do Claude Rains from The Invisible Man crazy yeah you think I'm crazy I'll show you who's crazy I said well I better put a spin on that it's not the greatest Claude Rains ever but I don't want to be spot on doing Claude Rains so you start adding other elements I said I want him to be teetering into into like he's like trying to maintain sanity and he's like on the verge of just losing it and I thought of the blue meanie from a yellow submarine to have it be and so I put a little mix of the blue meanie and with with Claude Rains and I mean believe me I have so many different influences that sometimes you're not even conscious that you're doing them until somebody points it out later so and like I say no I'm never confident I mean I really think sometimes I have my moments that I'm effective and sometimes I feel like the biggest fraud in the world where they're going to come to my door and want money back I was so terrible but now I can be terrible in i Max and 3d on a really really big screen but I'm telling you it's it's to be sitting here in front of you now if you told me that I would someday be at Oxford talking to people that are interested in anything I have to say I would have said you were out of your mind so I really want to thank you all for making me feel so at home and it's oddly comforting and reassuring to know that I have the lowest IQ in the room thank you you

Channel: OxfordUnion

Views: 880,505

Rating: 4.9428453 out of 5

Keywords: Oxford, Union, Oxford Union, Oxford Union Society, debate, debating, The Oxford Union, Oxford University, Mark Hamill, Luke Skywalker, Star Wars, Actor, JJ Abrams, George Lucas, film, the joker, skywalker, voice actor

Id: _5Iv_sazoGg

Length: 71min 46sec (4306 seconds)

Published: Tue Mar 08 2016

Reddit Comments

[u/[deleted]]

The guy is such a legend.

 

I hope Lucasfilm realise how much pulling power he has. People are dying to see more Luke Skywalker. Yes, Rey and the new cast are amazing, but please please let us see some more Luke in 8 and 9.

[u/[deleted]]

I love Mark Hamill, he just seems like such a genuinely nice and cool guy that loves this fans

[u/[deleted]]

She was sitting next to Carrison and Harrie

and he continues on without a scooby while everyone else is laughing

[u/thefrenchhornguy]

By the time Mark Hamill finishes answering a question I've totally forgotten what the actual question was. I really love that interviews with the guy are basically just Mark Hamill Storytime.

[u/jarjarewok]

Three things that I think he pretty much confirmed if you read between the lines. None are surprises. One, Rey is Luke's daughter. Two, Luke will be an ObiWan like supporting character in this trilogy. Three, Mark Hamill is loving life. I am happy for all three.

[u/OfficialGarwood]

Here's one he did at Cambridge.

[u/chaosaxess]

You know, listening to the interview, I realized something after recently rewatching the second TFA trailer. I don't think Mark will use his normal speaking voice in the movies. He doesn't sound anything like "Luke Skywalker" did in the OT or does in the trailer. He actually has to change his voice to sound like Luke used to. Kinda interesting.

[u/kaleidescope]

Rey is Luke's daughter. Confirmed.

[u/Arknell]

Wow, I thought I had read a lot of the making of Star Wars but he is so full of cool anecdotes and tidbits it's crazy, and I love his stories that take on a life of their own, reminds me of Orson Welles, I could listen to him all day.

(btw, watch Orson Welles on Dick Cavett, his yarnspinning is second to none, especially when he met Hitler in the '20s)