In terms of rampant hype, it is even giving the original space opera trilogy, which helped usher in the Hollywood blockbuster era and sold hundreds of millions of plastic lightsabers, a run for its galactic credits. But the British actor who appeared as Darth Vader in all three movies says he has not even seen the trailer for JJ Abrams’s Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
Dave Prowse, who portrayed the deadly Sith Lord onscreen for Star Wars (1977), The Empire Strikes Back (1980) and Return of the Jedi (1983), told Yahoo! Movies he wasn’t “the slightest bit interested” in any of Disney’s new Star Wars films – at least four are currently planned – unless he got to play Vader once again.
“It depends,” he said. “It depends if I’m playing the part of Darth Vader in it … Yes – then I’d be very interested. But if they’re putting somebody else in Darth Vader’s mask, then I’m not the slightest bit interested.”
Of the latest, apparently final trailer for Abrams’s film, which has been viewed a staggering 50m times on YouTube, Prowse said: “I haven’t seen it at all. No. I’ve seen nothing about it whatsoever. No. No.”
He added: “The new film, I know absolutely nothing about. I don’t really want to talk about it as I know nothing about it whatsoever … not being involved in it, I really haven’t got much interest. You know … not a lot, no.”
The 80-year-old actor and former bodybuilder was in the Vader suit for much of the Sith Lord’s screen time and reputedly even got to speak his lines on set, though his west country tones were dubbed over with those of American actor James Earl Jones in post-production, and many of the fight scenes featured British Olympic fencer Bob Anderson. To add insult to injury, when Vader’s face was finally shown to audiences as he lay dying in 1983’s Return of the Jedi, producer George Lucas chose to cast the British stage actor Sebastian Shaw instead.
Abrams should perhaps not take the slight on The Force Awakens personally. Prowse has previously signalled his disinterest in Lucas’s oft-maligned prequel trilogy, which attempted to tell the story of how Jedi Anakin Skywalker was turned to the dark side. “I didn’t like Star Wars I, II and III at all,” he told the Hull Daily Mail in 2013. “I think the common opinion now is they were really bad movies. There’s no comparison with the original movies. They had a much more believable story.”
Yet intriguingly, Prowse has still been tweeting about The Force Awakens, the latest trailer for which features crossguard lightsaber-wielding Vader fanboy Kylo Ren addressing the ruined helmet once worn by the dead Sith Lord.
So, he thinks he can finish what I started does he? #DarthVader pic.twitter.com/83wxvshdtB
— Dave Prowse (@isDARTHVADER) October 20, 2015
Prowse is not the only Star Wars alumnus left nonplussed by the hype surrounding The Force Awakens. Lucas himself said in April that he had not seen the film’s previous trailer, though the Funny or Die website was quick to imagine him doing so.
