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INTERVIEW: MICHAEL PENNINGTON
02 performance—the rest of the company decided
to recreate the entire scene with me. The trouble
was, the guy doing Darth Vader (not in costume,
I hasten to add) knew all the lines but I couldn’t
remember any of them. I’d completely forgotten
every line, so they had to keep prompting me!
In the years since making Return of the Jedi,
has your professional path crossed with any of
the other actors you worked with on Star Wars?
Ian McDiarmid, who played the Emperor, is a
very old friend of mine, and a colleague from
my Royal Shakespeare Company days. We’ve
worked together many, many times. When we
were shooting Return of the Jedi, Ian was always
in the makeup chair very early each morning,
because the makeup for the Emperor was quite
considerable. I’d go into his room and make fun of
him. I’d say, “Which of your great Shakespearean
performances is this, Ian? Is it Shylock?” I won’t
mention the language he used to stop me, but
it was all in good fun. So I knew Ian well, and I
knew Richard Marquand a bit because we had
overlapped at university. But on set, I really only
met Dave Prowse, as there wasn’t anybody else
in our scenes to meet.
You made your first convention appearance
during 2018. What kept you away from the
Star Wars convention scene for so long?
Well, we shot Star Wars: Return of the Jedi in
1982, so you can see how long it has been. I
remember when we were shooting the film, Dave
03
PENNINGTON’S
PROGRESS
Born on June 4, 1943, Michael Pennington
began his acting career when he joined England’s
National Youth Theater. He first played Hamlet in
a student production in 1964, and has performed
in the play no less than five times. Pennington
became a member of the Royal Shakespeare
Company (for the first time) after graduating
from university, and in 1986 he founded the
English Shakespeare Company.
The actor has starred in numerous West End
productions, including works by Henrik Ibsen, Tom
Stoppard, and Anton Chekov, during a career
spanning six decades and many of the great stage
roles, including King Lear and Macbeth. He has
also written numerous books on stage craft.
Prowse said to me, “You must do the conventions,
you’ll have a wonderful time,” but for some reason
I didn’t respond, and also I didn’t know what was
involved. I’ve been working in the theatre for
most of the last 30 years, so I’ve just been busy
with other things. Then my agent suggested I do
one and I thought, ‘Yeah, of course I should do
this, especially at my time of life’. And it’s been
fantastic! I don’t know what I’d imagined, but I’ve
been very touched by the enthusiasm of people
who want pictures and photographs. So, yes, now
I would like to do more (laughs).
The Star Wars films have a special place in
movie history. How do you feel about being
a part of that?
In a way it’s easy to be flippant about it, but these
films mean so much to people. I’ve worked with
actors who are now in their 40s and 50s who were
kids when the fi lms first came out. They’re far
more interested in my experiences on that fi lm
than they are in me having played Hamlet or
anything like that. It’s very interesting. I must say,
I’ve had a whale of a time. It’s lovely.
In the unlikely event Jerjerrod survived the
destruction of the Death Star, what do you
think would have happened to him?
I think he would have probably joined up with the
rebels. Maybe he would have had a conversion,
like Paul on the road to Damascus; “I’ve lived
my life all wrong by having anything to do with
Darth Vader and the Emperor,” he’d say. It would
make for a nice, rounded, Shakespearean role. He
could come back in the new films as a very, very
elderly Moff! I think that’s a good idea!
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