Mark Hamill Begged George Lucas to Cut His Most Embarrassing Star Wars Line to Save His Reputation

Mark Hamill gained worldwide stardom when he starred as the protagonist Luke Skywalker in George Lucas’ legendary space opera Star Wars. Hamill had only made a few appearances on TV before he was tasked with headlining the soon-to-be billion-dollar franchise and has not looked back since.

While Hamill owes much of his stardom to Lucas’ amazing vision in the first film, he still had many criticisms over some of the director’s practices. He reportedly had an issue with some lines of dialogue spoken in the film as it felt nothing like a human would say. Hamill revealed that he begged Lucas to change the line, after which the director finally obliged.

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Mark Hamill Begged George Lucas to Change One Line In Star Wars

The legacy of the Star Wars franchise, which has spawned multiple sequels, prequels, comics, TV shows, action figures, theme park rides, books, and more can be traced back to George Lucas’ uncompromising vision in the first Star Wars. The space opera that took place across galaxies far away from Earth was always a hard sell for any production company involved due to its whacky characters and setting. However, Lucas still managed to pull it off.

Lucas’ vision was reportedly questioned on multiple occasions by the talent involved. Mark Hamill, who played Luke Skywalker in the original and sequel trilogies, revealed that he was not happy with a line of dialogue that Lucas had written for the 1977 film and he practically begged him to change it. 

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Speaking about it on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson in 1977, Mark Hamill said,

“I remember that there was one line that I just begged him to take out of the screenplay, and he finally did. Boy, I’ll never forget it as long as I live. I sometimes dream about this line.”

The line in question was reportedly a scene of dialogue between Harrison Ford’s Han Solo and Luke Skywalker after the Imperial Forces destroyed the planet of Alderaan. Solo reportedly tells him that he would be going on his way as he had held up his end of the bargain. Mark Hamill recounted the lines,

“Then I say, “But we can’t turn back, fear is their greatest defence. I doubt if the actual security there is any greater than it was on Aquilae or Sullust and what there is is most likely directed towards a large-scale assault.”…And I thought, ‘Who talks like this, George? This is really not fair, because you know we’re the ones who are gonna get vegetables thrown at us. Not you!’”

The actor mentioned that George Lucas finally agreed to change the line, with the sentiment left intact.

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Other Actors Had Issues With George Lucas’ Lines

Mark Hamill was not the only actor in the franchise who had issues with George Lucas’ dialogue. Lucas has been criticized for his lines of dialogue, especially in the prequel Star Wars trilogy. His lines have often been described as wooden, corny, and often devoid of any emotion.

Actor Alec Guinness, who played Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars: A New Hope, reportedly complained about bad dialogue from Lucas in a letter he had written. In the letter, as read by Oscar Isaac for BBC, Guinness reportedly said,

“New rubbish dialogue reaches me every other day on wedges of pink paper, and none of it makes my character clear or even bearable.”

George Lucas admitted to his lack of dialogue writing sense himself in an interview with Empire in 1999. He defended his style by saying that he felt that great dialogue was not necessary for a good film and that he used it only as a medium to move the plot along. He said,

“I’d be the first person to say I can’t write dialogue. My dialogue is very utilitarian and is designed to move things forward. I’m not Shakespeare. It’s not designed to be poetic…After a while of working in the medium, I decided that wasn’t ultimately essential to making the movies. So in the last few movies, we did not try and be clever with the dialogue.”

Lucas also mentioned that the style of Star Wars was a reference to the 1930s style seen in Westerns and weekend matinees. He defended it, saying that they were supposed to be melodramatic.