George Walton Lucas Jr.[1] (born May 14, 1944) is an American filmmaker. Lucas is best known for creating the Star Wars and Indiana Jones franchises and founding Lucasfilm, LucasArts, Industrial Light & Magic and THX. He served as chairman of Lucasfilm before selling it to The Walt Disney Company in 2012.[2] Lucas is one of history's most financially successful filmmakers and has been nominated for four Academy Awards. His films are among the 100 highest-grossing movies at the North American box office, adjusted for ticket-price inflation.[3] Lucas is considered to be one of the most significant figures of the 20th-century New Hollywood movement, and a pioneer of the modern blockbuster.
Lucas was born and raised in Modesto, California, the son of Dorothy Ellinore Lucas (née Bomberger) and George Walton Lucas Sr., and is of German, Swiss-German, English, Scottish, and distant Dutch and French descent.[4] His family attended Disneyland during its opening week in July 1955, and Lucas would remain enthusiastic about the park.[5] He was interested in comics and science fiction, including television programs such as the Flash Gordon serials.[6] Long before Lucas began making films, he yearned to be a racecar driver, and he spent most of his high school years racing on the underground circuit at fairgrounds and hanging out at garages. On June 12, 1962, a few days before his high school graduation, Lucas was driving his souped-up Autobianchi Bianchina when another driver broadsided him,[lower-alpha 1] flipping his car several times before it crashed into a tree; Lucas's seatbelt had snapped, ejecting him and thereby saving his life.[7] However, his lungs were bruised from severe hemorrhaging and he required emergency medical treatment.[7] This incident caused him to lose interest in racing as a career, but also inspired him to pursue his other interests.[8][9]
Lucas's father owned a stationery store, and had wanted George to work for him when he turned 18. Lucas had been planning to go to art school, and declared upon leaving home that he would be a millionaire by the age of 30.[10][lower-alpha 2] He attended Modesto Junior College, where he studied anthropology, sociology, and literature, amongst other subjects.[8] He also began shooting with an 8mm camera, including filming car races.[8] At this time, Lucas and his friend John Plummer became interested in Canyon Cinema: screenings of underground, avant-garde 16mm filmmakers like Jordan Belson, Stan Brakhage, and Bruce Conner.[12] Lucas and Plummer also saw classic European films of the time, including Jean-Luc Godard's Breathless, François Truffaut's Jules et Jim, and Federico Fellini's 8½.[12] "That's when George really started exploring," Plummer said.[12] Through his interest in autocross racing, Lucas met renowned cinematographerHaskell Wexler, another race enthusiast.[8][12] Wexler, later to work with Lucas on several occasions, was impressed by Lucas's talent.[8] "George had a very good eye, and he thought visually," he recalled.[12]
At Plummer's recommendation,[13] Lucas then transferred to the University of Southern California (USC) School of Cinematic Arts. USC was one of the earliest universities to have a school devoted to motion picture film. During the years at USC, Lucas shared a dorm room with Randal Kleiser. Along with classmates such as Walter Murch, Hal Barwood, and John Milius, they became a clique of film students known as The Dirty Dozen. He also became good friends with fellow acclaimed student filmmaker and future Indiana Jones collaborator, Steven Spielberg.[lower-alpha 3] Lucas was deeply influenced by the Filmic Expression course taught at the school by filmmaker Lester Novros which concentrated on the non-narrative elements of Film Form like color, light, movement, space, and time. Another inspiration was the Serbian montagist (and dean of the USC Film Department) Slavko Vorkapić, a film theoretician who made stunning montage sequences for Hollywood studio features at MGM, RKO, and Paramount. Vorkapich taught the autonomous nature of the cinematic art form, emphasizing the kinetic energy inherent in motion pictures.
After graduating with a bachelor of fine arts in film in 1967, he tried joining the United States Air Force as an officer, but he was immediately turned down because of his numerous speeding tickets. He was later drafted by the Army for military service in Vietnam, but he was exempted from service after medical tests showed he had diabetes, the disease that killed his paternal grandfather.
In 1967, Lucas re-enrolled as a USC graduate student in film production.[15] He began working under Verna Fields for the United States Information Agency, where he met his future wife Marcia Griffin.[16] Working as a teaching instructor for a class of U.S. Navy students who were being taught documentary cinematography, Lucas directed the short film Electronic Labyrinth: THX 1138 4EB, which won first prize at the 1967–68 National Student film festival. Lucas was awarded a student scholarship by Warner Bros. to observe and work on the making of a film of his choosing. The film he chose after finding the animation department closed down was Finian's Rainbow (1968) which was being directed by Francis Ford Coppola, who was revered among film school students of the time as a cinema graduate who had "made it" in Hollywood. In 1969, Lucas was one of the camera operators on the classic Rolling Stones concert film Gimme Shelter.
1969–1977: THX 1138, American Graffiti, and Star Wars
In 1969, Lucas co-founded the studio American Zoetrope with Coppola, hoping to create a liberating environment for filmmakers to direct outside the perceived oppressive control of the Hollywood studio system.[17] Coppola thought Lucas's Electronic Labyrinth could be adapted into his first full-length feature film,[18] which was produced by American Zoetrope as THX 1138, but was not a success. Lucas then created his own company, Lucasfilm, Ltd., and directed the successful American Graffiti (1973).
Lucas then set his sights on adapting Flash Gordon, an adventure serial from his childhood that he fondly remembered. When he was unable to obtain the rights, he set out to write an original space adventure that would eventually become Star Wars.[19] Despite his success with his previous film, all but one studio turned Star Wars down. It was only because Alan Ladd Jr. at 20th Century Fox liked American Graffiti that he forced through a production and distribution deal for the film, which ended up restoring Fox to financial stability after a number of flops.[20]Star Wars was significantly influenced by samurai films of Akira Kurosawa, Spaghetti Westerns, as well as classic sword and sorcery fantasy stories.
Star Wars quickly became the highest-grossing film of all-time, displaced five years later by Spielberg's E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. After the success of American Graffiti and prior to the beginning of filming on Star Wars, Lucas was encouraged to renegotiate for a higher fee for writing and directing Star Wars than the US$150,000 agreed.[8] He declined to do so, instead negotiating for advantage in some of the as-yet-unspecified parts of his contract with Fox, in particular, ownership of licensing and merchandising rights (for novelizations, clothing, toys, etc.) and contractual arrangements for sequels.[8][21] Lucasfilm has earned hundreds of millions of dollars from licensed games, toys, and collectibles created for the franchise.[8]
The original Star Wars film went through a tumultuous production, and during editing, Lucas suffered chest pains initially feared to be a heart attack, but actually a fit of hypertension and exhaustion. The effort that Lucas exerted during post-production for the film, and its subsequent sequels, caused strains on his relationship with his wife Marcia Lucas, and was a contributing factor to their divorce at the end of the trilogy.[19] The success of the first Star Wars film also resulted in more attention focused on Lucas, both positive and negative, attracting wealth and fame but also many people who wanted Lucas's financial backing or just to threaten him.[22]
Following the release of the first Star Wars film, Lucas worked extensively as a writer and producer, including on the many Star Wars spinoffs made for film, television, and other media. Lucas acted as executive producer for the next two Star Wars films, commissioning Irvin Kershner to direct The Empire Strikes Back, and Richard Marquand to direct Return of the Jedi, while receiving a story credit on the former and sharing a screenwriting credit with Lawrence Kasdan on the latter.[23] Lucas also gave away his writing story credit out of great respect for Leigh Brackett for The Empire Strikes Back after her death from cancer.[24] He also acted as story writer and executive producer on all four of the Indiana Jones films, which his colleague and good friend Steven Spielberg directed.
The animation studio Pixar was founded in 1979 as the Graphics Group, one third of the Computer Division of Lucasfilm.[26] Pixar's early computer graphics research resulted in groundbreaking effects in films such as Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan[27] and Young Sherlock Holmes,[27] and the group was purchased in 1986 by Steve Jobs shortly after he left Apple Computer. Jobs paid Lucas $5million and put $5million as capital into the company. The sale reflected Lucas's desire to stop the cash flow losses from his seven-year research projects associated with new entertainment technology tools, as well as his company's new focus on creating entertainment products rather than tools. As of June 1983, Lucas was worth $60million,[28] but he met cash-flow difficulties following his divorce that year, concurrent with the sudden dropoff in revenues from Star Wars licenses following the theatrical run of Return of the Jedi. At this point, Lucas had no desire to return to Star Wars, and had unofficially canceled the sequel trilogy.[29]
Also in 1983, Lucas and Tomlinson Holman founded the audio company THX Ltd.[30] The company was formerly owned by Lucasfilm and contains equipment for stereo, digital, and theatrical sound for films, and music. Skywalker Sound and Industrial Light & Magic, are the sound and visual effects subdivisions of Lucasfilm, while Lucasfilm Games, later renamed LucasArts, produces products for the gaming industry.
1993–2012: Return to directing, Star Wars and Indiana Jones
Having lost much of his fortune in a divorce settlement in 1987, Lucas was reluctant to return to Star Wars.[29] However, the prequels, which were still only a series of basic ideas partially pulled from his original drafts of "The Star Wars", continued to tantalize him with technical possibilities that would make it worthwhile to revisit his older material. When Star Wars became popular once again, in the wake of Dark Horse's comic book line and Timothy Zahn's trilogy of spin-off novels, Lucas realized that there was still a large audience. His children were older, and with the explosion of CGI technology he began to consider directing once again.[31]
By 1993, it was announced, in Variety among other sources, that Lucas would be making the prequels. He began penning more to the story, indicating that the series would be a tragic one, examining Anakin Skywalker's fall to the dark side. Lucas also began to change the status of the prequels relative to the originals; at first, they were supposed to be a "filling-in" of history tangential to the originals, but now he saw that they could form the beginning of one long story that started with Anakin's childhood and ended with his death. This was the final step towards turning the film series into a "Saga".[32] In 1994, Lucas began work on the screenplay of the first prequel, tentatively titled Episode I: The Beginning.
In 1997, to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Star Wars, Lucas restored the original trilogy, also making numerous modifications using newly available digital technology to bring them closer to his original vision. The films were re-released in theaters as the "Special Edition".[33][34][35] The trilogy received further modifications and restorations for DVD releases in 2004, Blu-ray releases in 2011, and 4K releases released in 2019. Additionally, Lucas released a director's cut of THX 1138 in 2004, with the film re-cut and containing a number of CGI additions.
George Lucas, Berlin 2005 (Portrait by Oliver Mark)
The first Star Wars prequel was finished and released in 1999 as Episode I – The Phantom Menace, which would be the first film Lucas had directed in over two decades. Following the release of the first prequel, Lucas announced that he would also be directing the next two, and began working on Episode II.[36] The first draft of Episode II was completed just weeks before principal photography, and Lucas hired Jonathan Hales, a writer from The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, to polish it.[37] It was completed and released in 2002 as Attack of the Clones. The final prequel, Episode III – Revenge of the Sith, began production in 2002[38] and was released in 2005. Numerous older fans and critics considered the prequels inferior to the original trilogy,[39][40][41] though they were box office successes and popular with younger fans.[42][43][44][45] In 2004, Lucas reflected that his transition from independent to corporate filmmaker mirrored the story of Star Wars character Darth Vader in some ways, but concluded he was glad to be able to make his films the way he wants them.[46]
Lucas in 2007
Lucas collaborated with Jeff Nathanson as a writer of the 2008 film Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, directed by Steven Spielberg. Like the Star Wars prequels, the reception was mixed with fans and critics alike. From 2008 to 2014, Lucas also served as the creator and executive producer for a second Star Wars animated series on Cartoon Network, Star Wars: The Clone Wars which premiered with a feature film of the same name before airing its first episode. The supervising director for this animated series was Dave Filoni, who was chosen by Lucas and closely collaborated with him on its development.[47][48][49][50][51] This series bridged the events between Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, and featured the last Star Wars stories in which Lucas was involved in a major way.
In 2012, Lucas served as executive producer for Red Tails, a war film based on the exploits of the Tuskegee Airmen during World War II. He also took over direction of reshoots while director Anthony Hemingway worked on other projects.
2012–present: Semi-retirement
I'm moving away from the business ... From the company, from all this kind of stuff.
In January 2012, Lucas announced his retirement from producing large blockbuster films and instead re-focusing his career on smaller, independently budgeted features.[52][53][54]
In June 2012, it was announced that producer Kathleen Kennedy, a long-term collaborator with Steven Spielberg and a producer of the Indiana Jones films, had been appointed as co-chair of Lucasfilm Ltd.[55][56] It was reported that Kennedy would work alongside Lucas, who would remain chief executive and serve as co-chairman for at least one year, after which she would succeed him as the company's sole leader.[55][56] With the sale of Lucasfilm to Disney, Lucas is currently Disney's second-largest single shareholder, after the estate of Steve Jobs.[57]
Lucas worked as a creative consultant on the Star Wars sequel trilogy's first film, The Force Awakens.[58] Lucas's involvement included attending early story meetings; according to Lucas, "I mostly say, 'You can't do this. You can do that.' You know, 'The cars don't have wheels. They fly with antigravity.' There's a million little pieces ... I know all that stuff."[59] Lucas's son Jett told The Guardian that his father was "very torn" about having sold the rights to the franchise, despite having hand-picked Abrams to direct, and that his father was "there to guide" but that "he wants to let it go and become its new generation."[60] Among the materials turned over to the production team were rough story treatments Lucas developed when he considered creating episodes VII–IX himself years earlier; in January 2015, Lucas stated that Disney had discarded his story ideas.[61][62]
Lucas with Secretary of State John Kerry in Washington, D.C., on December 5, 2015
The Force Awakens, directed by J. J. Abrams, was released on December 18, 2015. Kathleen Kennedy produced the film and its sequels.[63][64] The new sequel trilogy was jointly produced by Lucasfilm and The Walt Disney Company, which had acquired Lucasfilm in 2012.[65] During an interview with talk show host and journalist Charlie Rose that aired on December 24, 2015, Lucas likened his decision to sell Lucasfilm to Disney to a divorce and outlined the creative differences between him and the producers of The Force Awakens. Lucas went on to say that he needed to support the company and its employees who were going to suffer financially.[66] Lucas described the previous six Star Wars films as his "children" and defended his vision for them, while criticizing The Force Awakens for having a "retro feel", saying, "I worked very hard to make them completely different, with different planets, with different spaceships – you know, to make it new." Lucas also drew some criticism and subsequently apologized for his remark likening Disney to "white slavers".[67][68]
In 2015, Lucas wrote the CGI film Strange Magic, his first musical. The film was produced at Skywalker Ranch. Gary Rydstrom directed the movie.[69] At the same time the sequel trilogy was announced, a fifth installment of the Indiana Jones series also entered pre-development phase with Harrison Ford and Steven Spielberg set to return. Lucas originally did not specify whether the selling of Lucasfilm would affect his involvement with the film. In October 2016, Lucas announced his decision to not be involved in the story of the film but would remain an executive producer.[70][71] In 2016, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, the first film of a Star Wars anthology series was released. It told the story of the rebels who stole the plans for the Death Star featured in the original Star Wars film, and it was reported that Lucas liked it more than The Force Awakens.[72]The Last Jedi, the second film in the sequel trilogy, was released in 2017; Lucas described the film as "beautifully made".[73]
Lucas founded a film production company Lucasfilm in 1971,[79] and incorporated as Lucasfilm Ltd. on September 12, 1977.[80] In the mid-1970s, the company's offices were located on the Universal Studios Lot.[81] Lucas founded the Star Wars Corporation, Inc. as a subsidiary to control various legal and financial aspects of Star Wars (1977),[82] including copyright, and sequel and merchandising rights. It also produced the 1978 Star Wars Holiday Special for 20th Century Fox Television.[83] That year, Lucas hired Los Angeles-based real-estate specialist Charles Weber to manage the company, telling him that he could keep the job as long as he made money.[84] Lucas wanted the focus of the company to be making independent films, but the company gradually became enlarged from five employees to almost 100, increasing in middle management and running up costs. In 1980, after Weber asked Lucas for fifty million dollars to invest in other companies and suggested that they sell Skywalker Ranch to do so, Lucas fired Weber and had to let half of the Los Angeles staff go.[84] By the same year, the corporate subsidiary had been discontinued and its business was absorbed into the various divisions of Lucasfilm.
By June 2013, Lucas was considering establishing a museum, the Lucas Cultural Arts Museum, to be built on Crissy Field near the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, which would display his collection of illustrations and pop art, with an estimated value of more than $1billion. Lucas offered to pay the estimated $300million cost of constructing the museum, and would endow it with $400million when it opened, eventually adding an additional $400million to its endowment.[88] After being unable to reach an agreement with The Presidio Trust, Lucas turned to Chicago.[89] A potential lakefront site on Museum Campus in Chicago was proposed in May 2014.[90] By June 2014, Chicago had been selected, pending approval of the Chicago Plan Commission,[91] which was granted.[92] The museum project was renamed the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art. On June 24, 2016, Lucas announced that he was abandoning his plans to locate the museum in Chicago, due to a lawsuit by a local preservation group, Friends of the Parks, and would instead build the museum in California.[93] On January 17, 2017, Lucas announced that an 11-acre campus with green space and the museum's five-story 300,000 square foot building will be constructed over what was a parking lot in Exposition Park, Los Angeles, California.[94] It is due to be completed in 2025.[95]
Collaboration
John Williams
Lucas was also heavily involved and invested in the scoring process for the original Star Wars soundtrack, which was composed by John Williams, on the recommendation of his friend and colleague Steven Spielberg. Whilst initially wanting to use tracks and film music in a similar manner to 2001: A Space Odyssey, which served as the inspiration for the film, Williams advised against this and instead proposed a system of recurring themes (or leitmotifs) to enhance the story in the style of classical composers Gustav Holst, William Walton, and Igor Stravinsky; works that Lucas had used as "temp tracks" for Williams to gain inspiration from.[96][97] The film, and subsequent sequels and prequels, make use of the Main Title Theme, the Force Theme (less commonly referred to as Obi Wan Kenobi's Theme), the Rebel Alliance Theme, and Princess Leia's Theme (all introduced in this film) repeatedly. Subsequent films also added to the catalog of themes for different characters, factions, and locations.
The score was released to critical acclaim and won Williams his third Academy Award for Best Original Score. The score was listed by the American Film Institute in 2005 as the greatest film score of all time. The professional relationship formed by Lucas and Williams extended through to Williams working on all of Lucas's blockbuster franchise movies: the remaining two films of the Star Wars original trilogy; all three films of prequel trilogy developed over fifteen years later; and the five films of the Indiana Jones franchise, in which Williams reunited with his long-time collaborator Spielberg. In his collaborations with Lucas, Williams received six of his fifty-two Academy Award nominations (Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade). After Lucas sold Lucasfilm to Disney, Williams stayed on board with the franchise, and continued to score the remaining three films of the "Skywalker Saga" (The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi, and The Rise of Skywalker, for which he received a further three Oscar nominations), after which he announced his "retirement" from the series.[98]
Lucas was in attendance for a ceremony honoring Williams as the 44th recipient of the AFI Life Achievement Award, the first composer to receive the honor, and gave a speech in praise of their relationship and his work.[99] In interviews, and most famously at the 40th Anniversary Star Wars Celebration convention, Lucas has repeatedly reaffirmed the importance of Williams to the Star Wars saga, affectionately referring to him as the "secret sauce" of his movies.[100]
Philanthropy
Lucas is the wealthiest film celebrity in the world. His personal net worth is estimated to be between $7.5–9.4billion.[101][102] Lucas has pledged to give half of his fortune to charity as part of an effort called The Giving Pledge led by Bill Gates and Warren Buffett to persuade America's richest individuals to donate their financial wealth to charities.[103][104]
George Lucas Educational Foundation
In 1991, The George Lucas Educational Foundation was founded as a nonprofit operating foundation to celebrate and encourage innovation in schools. The foundation's content is available under the brand Edutopia, in an award-winning web site, social media and via documentary films. Lucas, through his foundation, was one of the leading proponents of the E-rate program in the universal service fund,[105] which was enacted as part of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. On June 24, 2008, Lucas testified before the United States House of Representatives subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet as the head of his Foundation to advocate for a free wireless broadband educational network.[106]
Proceeds from the sale of Lucasfilm to Disney
In 2012, Lucas sold Lucasfilm to The Walt Disney Company for a reported sum of $4.05billion.[65] It was widely reported at the time that Lucas intended to give the majority of the proceeds from the sale to charity.[107][108] A spokesperson for Lucasfilm said, "George Lucas has expressed his intention, in the event the deal closes, to donate the majority of the proceeds to his philanthropic endeavors."[108] Lucas also spoke on the matter: "For 41 years, the majority of my time and money has been put into the company. As I start a new chapter in my life, it is gratifying that I have the opportunity to devote more time and resources to philanthropy."[108]
On September 19, 2006, the University of Southern California announced that Lucas had donated $175–180million to his alma mater to expand the film school. It is the largest single donation to USC and the largest gift to a film school anywhere.[110] Previous donations led to the already-existing George Lucas Instructional Building and Marcia Lucas Post-Production building.[111][112]
In 2013, Lucas and his wife Mellody Hobson donated $25million to the Chicago-based not-for-profit After School Matters, of which Hobson is the chair.[89]
On April 15, 2016, it was reported that Lucas had donated between $501,000 and $1million through the Lucas Family Foundation to the Obama Foundation, which is charged with overseeing the construction of the Barack Obama Presidential Center on Chicago's South Side.[113]
Personal life
Lucas at the Time 100 2006 gala
In 1969, Lucas married film editor Marcia Lou Griffin,[114] who went on to win an Academy Award for her editing work on the original Star Wars film. They adopted a daughter, Amanda Lucas, in 1981,[115] and divorced in 1983.[114] Lucas subsequently adopted two more children as a single parent: daughter Katie Lucas, born in 1988, and son Jett Lucas, born in 1993.[115] His three eldest children all appeared in the three Star Wars prequels, as did Lucas himself. Following his divorce, Lucas was in a relationship with singer Linda Ronstadt in the 1980s.[116][117]
Lucas was born and raised in a Methodist family.[8] The religious and mythical themes in Star Wars were inspired by Lucas's interest in the writings of mythologist Joseph Campbell,[123] and he would eventually come to identify strongly with the Eastern religious philosophies he studied and incorporated into his films, which were a major inspiration for "the Force". Lucas has come to state that his religion is "Buddhist Methodist". He resides in Marin County.[124][125]
Lucas is a major collector of the American illustrator and painter Norman Rockwell. A collection of 57 Rockwell paintings and drawings owned by Lucas and fellow Rockwell collector and film director Steven Spielberg were displayed at the Smithsonian American Art Museum from July 2, 2010, to January 2, 2011, in an exhibition titled Telling Stories.[126]
Lucas has said that he is a fan of Seth MacFarlane's hit TV show Family Guy. MacFarlane has said that Lucasfilm was extremely helpful when the Family Guy crew wanted to parody their works.[127]
Lucas supported Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton in the run-up for the 2016 U.S. presidential election.[128]
The American Film Institute awarded Lucas its Life Achievement Award on June 9, 2005.[130] This was shortly after the release of Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith, about which he joked stating that, since he views the entire Star Wars series as one film, he could actually receive the award now that he had finally "gone back and finished the movie."
Lucas was nominated for four Academy Awards: Best Directing and Writing for American Graffiti and Star Wars. He received the academy's Irving G. Thalberg Award in 1991. He appeared at the 79th Academy Awards ceremony in 2007 with Steven Spielberg and Francis Ford Coppola to present the Best Director award to their friend Martin Scorsese. During the speech, Spielberg and Coppola talked about the joy of winning an Oscar, making fun of Lucas, who has not won a competitive Oscar.
Star Wars is an American epic space opera multimedia franchise created by George Lucas, which began with the eponymous 1977 film and quickly became a worldwide pop culture phenomenon. The franchise has been expanded into various films and other media, including television series, video games, novels, comic books, theme park attractions, and themed areas, comprising an all-encompassing fictional universe. Star Wars is one of the highest-grossing media franchises of all time.
Return of the Jedi is a 1983 American epic space opera film directed by Richard Marquand. The screenplay is by Lawrence Kasdan and George Lucas from a story by Lucas, who was also the executive producer. The sequel to Star Wars (1977) and The Empire Strikes Back (1980), it is the third installment in the original Star Wars trilogy, the third film to be produced, and the sixth chronological film in the "Skywalker Saga". The film stars Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Billy Dee Williams, Anthony Daniels, David Prowse, Kenny Baker, Peter Mayhew and Frank Oz.
Star Wars is a 1977 American epic space opera film written and directed by George Lucas, produced by Lucasfilm and distributed by 20th Century-Fox. It was the first film released in the Star Wars film series and fourth chronological chapter of the "Skywalker Saga". Set "a long time ago" in a fictional universe where the galaxy is ruled by the tyrannical Galactic Empire, the story focuses on a group of freedom fighters known as the Rebel Alliance, who aim to destroy the Empire's newest weapon, the Death Star. Luke Skywalker becomes caught in the conflict while learning the ways of a metaphysical power known as "the Force" from Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi. The cast includes Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Peter Cushing, Alec Guinness, David Prowse, James Earl Jones, Anthony Daniels, Kenny Baker, and Peter Mayhew.
Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith is a 2005 American epic space opera film written and directed by George Lucas. It stars Ewan McGregor, Natalie Portman, Hayden Christensen, Ian McDiarmid, Samuel L. Jackson, Christopher Lee, Anthony Daniels, Kenny Baker and Frank Oz. The sequel to The Phantom Menace (1999) and Attack of the Clones (2002), it is the sixth film in the Star Wars film series, the final installment in the Star Wars prequel trilogy, and third chronological chapter of the "Skywalker Saga".
Lucasfilm Ltd. LLC is an American film and television production company, founded by filmmaker George Lucas in 1971 in San Rafael, California; most of the company's operations were moved to San Francisco in 2005. It is a subsidiary of Walt Disney Studios, a division of Disney Entertainment, which is owned by The Walt Disney Company. The studio is best known for creating and producing the Star Wars and Indiana Jones franchises, as well as its leadership in developing special effects, sound, and computer animation for films.
Kathleen Kennedy is an American film producer and president of Lucasfilm. In 1981, she co-founded the production company Amblin Entertainment with Steven Spielberg and her husband Frank Marshall.
Changes in Star Wars re-releases vary from minor differences in color timing, audio mixing, and take choices to major insertions of new visual effects, additions of characters and dialogue, scene expansions, and replacement of original cast members with newer ones. Though changes were also made to the prequel trilogy, the original trilogy saw the most alteration. Dissatisfied with the original theatrical cuts of the original Star Wars film, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi, creator George Lucas altered the films in ways that were ostensibly not initially possible, primarily due to limitations of time, budget, and technology.
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is a 2008 American action adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg and written by David Koepp, from a story by Jeff Nathanson and franchise creator George Lucas. The fourth installment in the Indiana Jones series, it was released and takes place 19 years after the previous film. Set in 1957, it pits Indiana Jones against Soviet KGB agents led by Irina Spalko searching for a telepathic crystal skull located in Peru. Jones is aided by his former lover, Marion Ravenwood, and their son, Mutt Williams. Ray Winstone, John Hurt, and Jim Broadbent are also part of the supporting cast.
The Star Wars prequel trilogy, colloquially referred to as the prequels, is a series of epic space-opera films written and directed by George Lucas. It was produced by Lucasfilm Ltd. and distributed by 20th Century Fox. The trilogy was released from 1999 to 2005 and is set before the original Star Wars trilogy (1977–83), chronologically making it the first act of the Skywalker saga. Lucas had planned a prequel trilogy before the release of the original film, but halted major Star Wars films beyond the original trilogy by 1981. When computer-generated imagery (CGI) had advanced to the level he wanted for the visual effects he wanted for subsequent films, Lucas revived plans for the prequels by the early 1990s. The trilogy marked Lucas's return to directing after a 22-year hiatus following the original Star Wars film in 1977, as well as a 16-year hiatus between the classic and prequel trilogies.
Dennis Muren, A.S.C is an American film visual effects artist and supervisor. He has worked on the films of George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, and James Cameron, among others, and has won nine Oscars in total: eight for Best Visual Effects and a Technical Achievement Academy Award. The Visual Effects Society has called him "a perpetual student, teacher, innovator, and mentor."
The Star Wars sequel trilogy is the third trilogy of the main Star Wars franchise, an American space opera created by George Lucas. It is produced by Lucasfilm Ltd. and distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures. The trilogy consists of episodes VII through IX, chronologically following the prequel trilogy and the original trilogy, serving as the final act of the "Skywalker saga". Lucas had planned a sequel trilogy as early as 1976, but canceled it by 1981. He produced only the first six episodes, and for a time described these as comprising the complete story. The sequel trilogy concept was revived when the Walt Disney Company entered negotiations to acquire Lucasfilm in 2011. Lucas produced new story treatments, but these were largely discarded. Both the acquisition and plans to produce the trilogy were announced in late 2012.
Katie Rose Lucas is an American actress and writer. She is the daughter of filmmaker George Lucas, god-daughter of both Steven Spielberg and Francis Ford Coppola, younger sister of Amanda Lucas, and older sister of Jett Lucas and Everest Hobson Lucas.
Indiana Jones is an American media franchise based on the adventures of Dr. Henry Walton "Indiana" Jones, Jr., a fictional professor of archaeology, that began in 1981 with the film Raiders of the Lost Ark. In 1984, a prequel, The Temple of Doom, was released, and in 1989, a sequel, The Last Crusade. A fourth film followed in 2008, titled The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. A fifth and final film, titled The Dial of Destiny, premiered at the 76th Cannes Film Festival on May 18, 2023 and is scheduled to be theatrically released in the United States on June 30, 2023. The series was created by George Lucas and stars Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones. The first four films were directed by Steven Spielberg, who worked closely with Lucas during their production.
Star Wars: The Clone Wars is a 2008 American computer-animated epic space opera film directed by Dave Filoni, produced by Lucasfilm Ltd. and Lucasfilm Animation, and distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures, becoming the first Star Wars film to not be released by 20th Century Fox. It is the first fully animated film in the Star Wars franchise and takes place shortly after Episode II – Attack of the Clones (2002), at the start of the titular Clone Wars. In the film, Count Dooku and Jabba the Hutt's uncle Ziro orchestrate a plan to turn Jabba against the Galactic Republic by framing the Jedi for the kidnapping of his son. While Anakin Skywalker and his newly assigned apprentice Ahsoka Tano attempt to deliver the child back to his father, Obi-Wan Kenobi and Padmé Amidala lead separate investigations to uncover Dooku and Ziro's plot.
Star Wars has been expanded to media other than the original films. This spin-off material is licensed and moderated by Lucasfilm, though during his involvement with the franchise Star Wars creator George Lucas reserved the right to both draw from and contradict it in his own works. Such derivative works have been produced concurrently with, between, and after the original, prequel, and sequel trilogies, as well as the spin-off films and television series. Commonly explored Star Wars media include books, comic books, and video games, though other forms such as audio dramas have also been produced.
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny is a 2023 American action adventure film directed by James Mangold and co-written by Mangold, Jez Butterworth, John-Henry Butterworth, and David Koepp. Produced by Walt Disney Pictures and Lucasfilm Ltd. and distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures, the film is a sequel to Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008) and serves as the fifth and final installment in the Indiana Jones film series. The film stars Harrison Ford in his final portrayal of archaeologist Indiana Jones. John Rhys-Davies and Karen Allen reprise their roles as Sallah and Marion Ravenwood, respectively, from earlier films. New cast members include Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Antonio Banderas, Toby Jones, Boyd Holbrook, Ethann Isidore, and Mads Mikkelsen.
Pablo Hidalgo is a Chilean-born creative executive based in California, currently working for Lucasfilm on the Star Wars franchise. He is frequently named as one of the people tasked with maintaining the canon of the franchise after its partial reboot in 2014 and often consults on Star Wars projects in development regarding their integration in the larger Star Wars canon. He is the author of several official references and guidebooks about the Star Wars, G.I. Joe and Transformers franchises.
Obi-Wan Kenobi is an American television miniseries created for the streaming service Disney+. It is part of the Star Wars franchise and stars Ewan McGregor as the title character, reprising his role from the Star Wars prequel trilogy. Set ten years after the events of Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith (2005), the series follows Kenobi as he sets out to rescue the kidnapped Princess Leia from the Galactic Empire, leading to a confrontation with his former apprentice, Darth Vader.
References
Footnotes
↑ Lucas was later ticketed for making an illegal left-hand turn.[7]
↑ After inducting 36 fantasy and science fiction writers and editors from 1996 to 2004, the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame dropped "fantasy" and made non-literary contributors eligible.[lower-alpha 5] Filmmaker Steven Spielberg was the inaugural "Film, Television and Media" inductee in 2005; Lucas the second in 2006. Previously Lucas had received a special award at the 1977 World Science Fiction Convention (for Star Wars) and annual professional achievement awards voted by fantasy fans in 1981 and 1982.[lower-alpha 6]
↑ W., Rinzler, J. (2010). "The Road to Oz". The Making of Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back: The Definitive Story (Digital). Del Rey Books. p.n390. OCLC657407687. I don't think Leigh Brackett would've gotten a story credit. I said that to George and he said, you know, from his heart he felt she should get a co-writing credit on it, so he gave that to her.-Howard Kazanjian "I didn't like the first script, but I gave Leigh credit because I liked her a lot," Lucas says. "She was sick at the time she wrote it and she really tried her best.
↑ Lucas, George (August 11, 2014). "George Lucas & Mellody Hobson"(PDF). The Giving Pledge. Archived from the original(PDF) on January 31, 2015. Retrieved January 31, 2015. My pledge is to the process; as long as I have the resources at my disposal, I will seek to raise the bar for future generations of students of all ages. I am dedicating the majority of my wealth to improving education.
↑ ""Presenting the 2006 Hall of Fame Inductees"". Archived from the original on April 26, 2006. Retrieved August 19, 2016.. Press release March 15, 2006. Science Fiction Museum (sfhomeworld.org). Archived April 26, 2006. Retrieved April 10, 2013.
Steve Baker, Ricky Blitt, Will Carlough, Tobias Carlson, Jacob Fleisher, Patrik Forsberg, Will Graham, James Gunn, Claes Kjellstrom, Jack Kukoda, Bob Odenkirk, Bill O'Malley, Matthew Alec Portenoy, Greg Pritikin, Rocky Russo, Olle Sarri, Elizabeth Wright Shapiro, Jeremy Sosenko, Jonathan van Tulleken, and Jonas Wittenmark – Movie 43 (2013)
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