“Kersh is the kind of director that if you pressure him too much to the point of saying, ‘We’ve got to have four shots by noon,’ it makes it worse for him,” Kurtz says. “He gets slower because he’s trying to figure out, ‘Let’s see, if I have to scratch out all of this, I can’t do this shot and I can’t do that shot.’ And he’ll sit there and brood for about two hours trying to figure out how to do it quickly. Well, it’s not worth that. And then the scene isn’t any good. So it’s silly, because you’re ruining the one thing that makes the picture: what you’ve got on film.”
“I don’t have the authority to pressure Kersh,” Watts says. “All I could do was to nudge from the sidelines because, in a sense, that’s the producer’s responsibility. And I think it was a very difficult situation for Gary. I think, partially, Kersh was maybe allowed a little more leeway in terms of the shooting schedule, which stemmed back even to the fire on Stage 3. Had we banged ahead, we might well have come upon a time where we literally had finished shooting and the next set wasn’t ready to go. I think it was very difficult sometimes because Kersh would say things to me that he wouldn’t always say to Gary.”
On May 6, Lucas arrived in London. As rumors had begun to spread within the industry, an internal memo had been issued to Lucasfilm executive staff—Weber, Kurtz, Kazanjian, Moohr, and Ganis—stating that for the time being “the official budget figures to be released […] should be referred to as direct costs [of] $17 million.” The reality was much more. “I discovered that they had started going over schedule,” Lucas says. “There were just a lot of things that had to be worked out that only I could really do, so I flew over. It began to be too much to work on the film while trying to create this company.”
“Charlie Weber and John Moohr were feeling their oats,” Kazanjian says. “They were the new big shots on campus and they wanted as much hands-on of the sequel to Star Wars as possible. But they didn’t know filmmaking.”
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Lucas talks about the pressures of producing and escalating costs on Empire, which would have ramifications for many at Lucasfilm and on the next sequel. (Interview during principal photography by Arnold, 1979)
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“George and Gary know that I pressure myself more than they can possibly pressure me,” Kershner says. “It’s a matter of pride to me to get the film done fast, to get it done well. I understand the need for compromise. There is no such thing as a perfect shot, a perfect film. The purpose of film is not to make a monument to oneself.”
“I had basically put everything I had into Empire,” Lucas says. “I took the money, everything I had from the first movie, and rolled it over into the second movie. The first one was budgeted at $13 million and then Fox said, ‘Make it for 7,’ but the thing came out to 11. The second one was budgeted at $20 million, but, about halfway through, it became very apparent that it wasn’t going to be 20. It was way over schedule and it had not been thought through carefully on the economic side. So we had to go back to the bank and get more money. I talked to the producer and said, ‘I have to have a real number here. I can’t have just what you would hope it would be or what you kind of guess it would be. I want to know what it is. Are you sure we can get this done for $25 million now?’ And he said, ‘Yes, we’re absolutely sure we can get it done.’ ”
“Empire is double the budget of Star Wars,” Kurtz explains, “partly due to the inflation of the business, the cost of lumber, of plastic pipe, of film stock, and everything else; plus, we had more sets and a longer shooting schedule.”
“So we said, ‘Okay. We’ll go get the money,’ ” Lucas says. “But when you’re actually standing there, saying to yourself, Okay, it’s my money, and shelling it out, you’re really betting that you can bring it in on schedule and on budget—and then you’re betting that people will go see it.”
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A behind-the-scenes look at Kershner (with viewfinder) on the Hoth hangar set as it’s being constructed in the Star Wars Stage, with producer Gary Kurtz. Note the panorama of the set in progress.
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On Monday, May 7, Carrie Fisher returned to London. To complete the hangar set on the Star Wars Stage, Welch ordered a night shift for one week, with more than 100 craftsmen, including 59 carpenters. That evening, the Kurtz family gave a baby shower for Mark and Marilou Hamill.
“The shower took place at the Kurtz home in Buckinghamshire, a fine, rambling homestead,” Arnold writes. “Mark stood up well to the sentimentality of the occasion while Marilou presided gracefully over the opening of gifts. Then came a treasure hunt in the gardens, which a particularly cold May Day made a bit of an endurance test … George Lucas has been with us since the weekend. I saw him standing in the conservatory at Wallingford House, in a group that included Kurtz, Kersh, and editor Paul Hirsch. There they were, filmmakers framed in glass, each very different physically, all bearded, like figures in a Degas painting. From my position in the tea tent, I had no way of knowing what they were discussing, but they looked at ease. These are not men whom it is easy to read. The film is behind schedule, but their demeanor reflected no such anxiety.”
SETUPS: 585; SCS. COMP: 108/468; SCREEN TIME: 54M 38S/130M.
Kershner behind the VistaRama camera.
Kershner studying the script.
Kershner working with first AD David Tomblin.
Unit publicist Alan Arnold (and author of Once Upon a Galaxy—A Journal of the Making of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back) talks with Kershner.
Arnold gets Lucas on tape.
Anthony Daniels (C-3PO) and Fisher (director of photography Peter Suschitzky is in background between them).
SHADOWS IN THE LIGHT
MAY TO JUNE 1979
CHAPTER SIX
Still with great secrecy, the creation of Yoda continued. “I just saw the prototype,” Hamill says. “It’s not the finished thing and it’s not the right color, but Stuart let me manipulate it, put my hand in, work it—and it’s amazing how his face comes to life. I got this eerie feeling like I’d seen him in a hundred movies before. He also bears a resemblance to Stuart Freeborn, I think, which is fine. I had lunch with George the other night and I mentioned that to him and he said, ‘Well, Stuart would make a great Yoda.’ ”
“We’ve been shooting tests and having a lot of discussion about Yoda,” Lucas says. “I’ve spent a lot of time on this, particularly when they were doing the sculpting of his head.”
REVERSALS
NOS. 46–49, WEDNESDAY, MAY 9–MONDAY, MAY 14: STAGE 8—INT. SNOWSPEEDER COCKPIT (TRAVELING MATTE), SCS. 82, 85, 91, ETC. [HOTH BATTLE]; STAGE 2—INT. CLOUD CITY CORRIDOR & DINING ROOM, 363, 364 [VADER TRAPS LUKE’S FRIENDS]
On Wednesday, May 9, Kershner filmed several Rebel pilots in the snowspeeder cockpit against bluescreen. “There were many days where we were just standing around,” says John Morton, who played Luke’s gunner, Dack (later changed to Dak for legal reasons). “They were hoping to get a window where they could run us over after lunch and shoot a little piece, so the actors had to be on call. We were juggled around with other things that were delayed for other reasons.”
On Thursday, a small fire broke out on the Falcon set and second unit filmed scenes in the Imperial walker cockpit on Stage 5 with Mike Hook as assistant director. To the bemusement of Lucas, Variety reported the same day that, according to Fox, Empire was guaranteed $26 million from exhibitors.
“I think Fox released that story because it was good for them and helped to get other exhibitors interested,” Kurtz says. “I don’t think it helped us any. In fact, it probably made it worse, because as far as the press was concerned, it just said to them that it doesn’t matter what the picture is like; we don’t have to make a good picture. Well, I think that’s a negative.”
According to the early math, after marketing and distribut
ion costs, Empire would still have to clear at least $50 million to make a profit—and not many films earned those kind of dollars (only 10 out of nearly 100 in 1979). And there was no guarantee that Empire would do Star Wars business. In 1970, Beneath the Planet of the Apes had taken in about about half of the first film’s profits; Godfather II (1974) had made far less than half of its predecessor’s US gross. More recently, in 1978, Jaws 2 had successfully cleared $100 million—but that figure was not even close to 50 percent of what Jaws earned—while James Bond in 1977’s The Spy Who Loved Me faltered with less than $50 million domestically.
It didn’t help that Empire’s production was still floundering: Over the weekend, after the construction night shift had struggled to finish its work on the Star Wars Stage, Welch, Reynolds, and others had a disagreeable moment when they realized that the newly available space would still be too small for both the hangar and the swamp sets—so a large extension had to be quickly planned, budgeted, and built. More drama ensued when a statement issued by the production office said that first unit would begin shooting on the Star Wars Stage next Friday “regardless of our schedule status at that time.” In other words, Kershner would have to start filming while the hangar set was still being constructed.
“The prime reason for adding to the stage has really been dictated by the size of the Falcon,” Reynolds says. “It takes up almost a quarter of the stage and to give the impression of depth and size, we’ve had to actually, virtually, extend the stage with this temporary structure by something like 60 feet or so.”
Having done what he could to stem the budget and time overflows, Lucas took Sir Alec Guinness to lunch on Saturday at the actor’s favorite restaurant—Neal’s in Covent Garden—according to Arnold, who writes, “I cannot yet get a definite statement as to whether Sir Alec will re-create his role as Ben Kenobi.”
The next day, Lucas returned to the United States, but he didn’t go home empty-handed. “Usually, I would never show any footage beyond the rushes to a producer,” Kershner says. “That’s protection for myself, because stuff is judged quite badly at this rough stage of editing. You usually want to complete your editing and then show it. At first, when George said he wanted to see the footage, I said no and he said fine. But then I thought about it. This is not a Hollywood production. I’m dealing with people who love film and who are trying to make the best picture. So I changed my mind. I told Gary, ‘Okay, when George comes over, I want you both to see everything I’ve cut, 50 minutes. If you have any impressions, let’s hear them now.’
“So I showed them the film and George took exception to only one scene, only because I ended it on a certain shot and I suddenly realized that perhaps I’d made an error. Gary had some very astute remarks, but they were minimal. In other words, they understand a work in progress; they’re professionals. I felt relieved that I had shown it. Now we’re going on.”
“Kersh is moving the camera a lot more,” Hirsch says. “In the first film, the camera hardly ever moved. A lot of the energy was generated from the editing. In this film, there are more camera movements and energy generated without cutting quite as rapidly, although that remains to be seen because we’re just getting started. It has a very polished look. The photography is really extraordinary.”
“George is a very fine editor, and he’s taking back all the battle sequences that we shot in Norway,” Kershner adds. “He’s going to go through it all and rough it together so that when Paul Hirsch and myself go back to San Francisco, we will not be starting with raw footage; we’ll be able to say, ‘By God, it’s there!’ or ‘No, I want to start over,’ or ‘Let’s fix this, this, and this.’ An ordinary producer can’t do that.”
“I’ll be working in Marin County when we’ve finished shooting here,” Hirsch says. “Meanwhile, we’re in communication with the ILM people via videotape cassette. We send them copies of scenes that have been shot so they can coordinate the design of the miniatures.”
“In order to finish the film on time, we’re forced to shoot production and postproduction at the same time,” says Kurtz. “The problem is that each can’t see what the other is doing. Consequently, we’re giving the telex machines quite a bit of work sending messages back and forth.”
“It’s always a problem with that gap of 6,000 miles,” says Johnson. “You can’t be in both places at once. Because Kersh was directing and not George, sometimes little things would happen and George would say, ‘We don’t really need this. We need that.’ ”
On Monday, Arnold was incensed when a journalist “worked her way into the studio under false pretenses, and poor Carrie was her victim. Their assignments are conditional on getting at the raw meat and this entails a sort of rape—which is how Carrie herself described the encounter to me later.”
An overhead view of Kershner directing Hamill and consecutive pilots and gunners in the full-sized snowspeeder prop (crew would rock the craft on command), circa May 10, 1979.
Kershner, Hamill (on right), and X-wing pilot extras.
SECRET BY DESIGN
NOS. 50–54, TUESDAY, MAY 15–MONDAY, MAY 21: STAGE 8—INT. COCKPIT MILLENNIUM FALCON, 206 [HAN SEES SNOWTROOPERS], 282 [LEIA KNOCKED INTO HAN’S ARMS]; STAGE 2—INT. LARGE PRISON CELL, 370 [CHEWIE FIXES C-3PO], 372 [HAN VS. LANDO]
In early 1979, director Stanley Donen had replaced John Barry at the helm of Saturn 3. “It must have been a grim disappointment to John Barry to have his story taken out of his hands,” Arnold writes. “The pleasure is that he has rejoined so many of his colleagues from Star Wars. ‘It is like coming home,’ he told me on the set today.”
“John was very depressed about what the producers were doing to his concepts for Saturn 3—which he wrote and designed,” Kurtz says. “He said he would love to join our ‘family’ again, so we offered him the job of second-unit director.”
“Second unit then developed into a unit to pick up quite big chunks which we had to leave behind, and also the matte work,” Suschitzky says. “I decided, after 12 weeks, that I needed another cameraman to help me out with the second unit and the matte work.”
“Sometimes we had a lot of fun, but second unit is the closest thing that I can remember to the tension,” says Fisher. “We did a lot more second unit on this; they were working, two and three and maybe four units at a time, so you were going from set to set and you had to sort of regroup your emotions for the particular requirement of each scene.”
“We needed someone who I felt could work with Kersh, who could really understand what he wanted and wouldn’t want to impose too strong a mark of their own, because that would create too much of a conflict,” Kurtz says. “To work as a second-unit director with Kersh is very difficult anyway, because he has a tendency not to like anything that he hasn’t shot, no matter what it is, because it’s different from the way he envisioned it in his head.”
Given the expanding chaos, a production meeting of department heads was held at the studio restaurant after completion of the day’s shooting on Wednesday. The art department was having increasing difficulties. “We had, I think, eight people all working on individual sets,” Bruton says. “You had a chap like assistant art director Fred Hole working on a certain set and then you’d have another chap from the art department working another set, and on and on!”
For Thursday and Friday, May 17 and 18, first unit moved to the large prison cell set on Stage 2, while second unit worked with Williams and Hamill on Stage 9, with Lando rescuing Luke from the underbelly of Cloud City.
“I filmed many shots of Solo as he is being tortured,” says Kershner. “There were flashes of electricity everywhere.”
“We had a scene where I have Han Solo in a torture chamber, but I have no idea how he got there!” Prowse says. “There is so much money involved now; everyone walks in fear and dread about getting ripped off; everything is so secretive—no one will tell you a thing. You got your script sections with dialogue and whatever descriptions were incorporated, and Kershner would give a sort
of briefing as to what went where, but nobody gave away the plot.”
As The Register of Santa Ana, California, would report, Prowse had a habit of “giving away plot secrets.” “He doesn’t mean to,” Hamill says. “He just has this real childlike quality to please.”
“David talks his head off,” Kershner says.
After Prowse revealed key moments to Starlog magazine—that Boba Fett was after Han Solo and that a disfigured Vader would be unmasked (printed in its June 1979 issue)—Lucasfilm began keeping track of who leaked what and where it was published. Its first report was telexed to the studio: “Harrison Ford, one leak; Carrie Fisher, one leak; David Prowse—nine leaks.”
“I talk at science-fiction conventions and I try to give them a little bit of information they don’t have,” Prowse admits. “And I’ll always say, ‘Whatever happens, don’t mention this to anybody.’ But I am responsible for more leaks of information on this picture than anybody. People ask me questions and I let things drop.”
“So they gave David pages of dummy scripts on this movie,” Hamill says. “He was saying lines I knew were not real. But he didn’t know I knew.”
At the dining room door, Arnold, Kershner, Ford, Fisher, and Williams.
The Making of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (Enhanced Edition) Page 29