I think the most telling sign that the internet rumors about
Star Wars: Episode II have gotten out of hand is that I myself was
recently interviewed by the "11th Hour" website as part of a series
on fans campaigning for the role. Of course I'm never campaigned
for anything in my life, and my "Annoying" character in Phantom
Movie was in some ways an anti-Anakin, and so is my outlook on life,
but I'm humoring the little bastards, because I find it so funny.
Anyway, any publicity is good publicity. So here goes, my attempting
to be serious and audtion for Anakin:
AN INTERVIEW WITH GARRETT GILCHRIST
by Sarah Kendzior of the 11th Hour
via email
Name: Garrett Gilchrist
Age: 18
Location: Carlsbad & Los Angeles, CA
Occupation: Writer, actor, motion picture director and USC student
SK: Hey Garrett. This is Sarah from The 11th Hour Webmagazine; you
wrote us recently about your desire to be Anakin Skywalker in Episode II.
GG: Yeah, well, Justin Bielawa, who played the Obi-Wan role in the
Phantom Menace parody movie I did, forwarded me an article by a
rather funny fellow about wanting to be Anakin. I thought, hey,
I PLAYED the Anakin role, in my movie. Certainly I didn't play it
straight; in the movie the Anakin character doesn't come from Star
Wars, he comes from American Graffiti, so I played him with this
awful Paul Le Mat voice. But the more I thought about it, the more
it occurred to me that I was really the perfect actor for the real
role. So I wrote this letter almost as a joke, and now I suppose
this interview is punishment for that. [laughs]
SK: How long have you been a "Star Wars" fan? What attracts you to the
series?
GG: Geez. I suppose like everyone else I'll have to admit that I
was a fan when I was a kid, but you kind of have to be, don't you?
I mean my parents were fans. They took me to see Return of the Jedi
over and over, and all the making-of specials, and when my father's
brother was getting rid of all his Star Wars toys, I got 'em. Those
toys were remaindered on the back-aisle then, and now they're fetching
these huge prices which is ludicrous! I've kept most of them, the
ones I didn't eat. I think once you get beyond the stage where you're
trying to color Admiral Ackbar blue with your crayons and bite 9-D-9's
head off, you know, around age 16 or so, then you have to reevaluate
the pictures. You grow up knowing these stupid movies by heart and
then when you're actually wanting to direct yourself you have to
look back at them and say, well, are they actually worthwhile pictures
or not? My generation was lucky because just when we were wondering
what we'd been watching all these years, we got to see them on the
big-screen again, with just a few extra scenes of terrible CGI that
almost ruined the movies but not quite. And you see them, and they're
better than you remembered. Except Jedi, which is piffle. You can
tell the actors in the first movie didn't give a rat's ass about
the director, which is really the right way to work with someone
like Lucas. You kind of have to realize that he doesn't quite know
what he's doing, that his wife is going to fix it all in the editing
room anyway, so have a bit of fun! I have great respect for Marcia
Lucas, because she worked on Taxi Driver and the first Star Wars.
I got to see Taxi Driver on the big screen, and that was something.
I mean, the editing is brilliant. If you ever see the rough cut
of Star Wars which has been released, a bit of it anyway, on CD-ROM,
it's the worst movie ever made. But it's so creative and different
that once you tighten it up, make the dialogue fit better, finish
all the action scenes, make the sound work, it's one of the twenty
or thirty best American pictures ever made. Everyone worked their
asses off, even Lucas, if not on the writing. It's like seeing "Citizen
Kane" or "The Seven Samurai," it's a fuckload of fun. And "Empire"
is so non-Lucas it's scary, but yet it reaps all the benefits of
what Lucas did with a professional crew, best of both worlds. "Jedi"
seems to be where Lucas is now, and it's not a smart film. Fun,
fast, but stupid, like Paul Le Mat says in "American Graffiti."
SK: Do you consider yourself to be a bigger "Star Wars" fan than most?
GG: Well, I've spent about three years of my life trying to make
"Star Wars"-like situations work as pure comedy, I suppose that
speaks of a fan. But not really, I mean I wouldn't go out and buy
a Boba Fett costume if it wasn't for a picture I was doing. Maybe
that's just my excuse. I still have all those toys. [laughs] I guess
I can just look back on it with a little distance unlike some, especially
since the Phantom Menace came and kind of ruined everything really.
SK: Tell me a little bit about your "Star Wars" interest, and how
the series has affected your life.
I co-wrote, directed and acted in a two-hour parody of "The Phantom
Menace," called "Dr. Fred's The Phantom Movie." It's the third in
a series of movies called "Dr. Fred's Amazing Exploding Cow Show,"
all a bunch of comedy sketches broadcast from a studio in my basement.
The first two followed a loose plot and had a lot of Star Wars references
in them, including cartoons with Darth Vader in them and this constant
thing about Mark Hamill's career. The second was called "Dr. Fred
Strikes Back," that should give you an idea of how much Star Wars
was in these things. Well, "Phantom Movie" took it all the way.
It was a Dr. Fred prequel, looking back at the origins of this comedy
team. We've got Whis-kei Jinn, a stinking drunk, and since Ewan
McGregor was Irish we use a Lucky Charms-style gnome, Boink, who
was in the first show, for that role. We actually call him Jar Jar
Boinks, which is a terrible mean name to give a fellow really. There's
Queen Amadeus, who is actually just queen of Wyoming, and since
Natalie always wore the white face paint we say ours is a mime.
I think Natalie was a mime too. There are two silly Japanese aliens,
Gerald and Ford [Gerald I played], who are like the silly aliens
in the movie, not understanding anything, getting knee-deep in evil,
starting wars and all that nonsense, and their lips don't work either.
Only we made ours a vaudeville team. They're trying to get a show
on local cable in Wyoming, and they fail the audition, so they have
to go start a war. They open up a pirate station, with real pirates,
and wind up starting the Vietnam war, which is not a smart thing
to do. I got to play Lord Hologram, who is pure evil but a bit confused
really. He's responsible for all the bad sitcoms in the galaxy,
Suddenly Susan, Charles in Charge ... probably responsible for the
Star Wars Holiday Special too. And parts of the Phantom Menace.
His assistant is an Indian fellow, Darth Ass-Kick, who has absolutely
nothing to do. He got drunk the night before and woke up with tattoos
all over his face, pretty disturbing. Anyway, Whis-Kei and Boink
go to the underwater city, which is in an aquarium, and meet Sta-Wa
Jinx [who I also played], a "comic relief" puppet who is in secret
a demonic presence who can destroy any program he's in, just like
the real Jar Jar. They also wind up crash-landing in 1962, and get
to live out most of "American Graffiti," which is where they meet the KID. Me.
SK: What did you think of "Episode 1: The Phantom Menace"?
Ian McDiarmid, who plays Palpatine, is a great, great actor. And
in terms of what you see onscreen, it's clearly the most visually
brilliant movie of the year by a long shot. Otherwise it's a total
waste of time! Jake Lloyd did help to ruin the Phantom Menace for
me, he was in Jingle All the Way remember, he really isn't all that
good. Maybe he's just not old enough yet, but I mean if you look
at Sarah Polley in "The Adventures of Baron Munchausen" [and you
should, it's a great, great film] she's about that age but the difference
is she can act. She's perfect for the role, which is important as
she's in it so much, and is vital to the plot. If Lloyd had had
some depth of character to him beyond just looking like a pissed-off
kid reading lines when he's rather be stealing his parents' credit
cards or whatever, that very imporant part of the movie would have
worked. But it didn't. Sarah Polley is a big star now, and Natalie
Portman was pretty young starting out too, and I don't think Jake
Lloyd will have that kind of success. Maybe it's harder to find
a young male kid who can act and be halfway likeable -- they're
all out playing soccer and frying ants. The movie just sort of had
the effect of making every actor in it seem inadequate. I think
Lucas made some very huge mistakes. He should have realized that
he was never all that good a director, and hadn't directed anything
in about two decades anyway, so he should have gone to the actors
on the first day and just said "help me." From what I hear, he didn't
even let them read their lines until the day of shooting. They had
no time to feel any comraderie like the first Star Wars cast did,
and they seem like they're just standing there, no character development,
very lost, not knowing what they're supposed to be doing or what
it all means but reading the lines anyway, very softly, waiting
for the next action scene which will at least be storyboarded for
them. The lightsaber scenes are brilliant, it's like watching a
Kurosawa picture in space. But there's no action. I mean, Liam Neeson
was in Schindler's List, but he was also in Krull and Darkman. He
doesn't act unless forced to, and barely then. And Darkman was by
Sam "Army of Darkness" Raimi, so you can't say it was the fault
of the director, necessarily. I liked it somewhat first viewing,
surrounded by Star Wars fans with a real buzz in the air that we
were seeing something great, but that's seeing it as a concert film,
where the quality of the music doesn't matter. When you actually
get the tape and bring it home, though, you'll eventually just bury
it in the back of your sock drawer and forget it. Metaphorically speaking.
SK: Why do you want to be Anakin Skywalker? Please elaborate.
GG: Pure hubris. I'm actually a real asshole. But I am right for
the part. Most of the qualities George tends to talk about in a
young Anakin are my own in real life. On top of that I would want
to play Anakin just to see what it would be like to work with some
of the people I idolized with a kid and still idolize now. But mostly
I would want to play Anakin just so no one else gets in and fucks
it up. I can't guarantee I would be what people want to see onscreen,
as I am a very strange fellow while performing by any standard.
But I would certainly give it my best shot. And just like Jake Lloyd,
either way I get an action figure.
SK: What qualifies you for the role of Anakin Skywalker? What special
qualities would you bring to the part?
Well, besides having memorized the films as a kid and directed one
of them as a teenager, I want to see Episode II succeed, bigtime.
I do honestly think Episode II will be a far better film by any
standard of measurement, just because Ewan and Natalie will get
to do their thing with a measure of experience behind them, and
they're great anyway. But what Lucas needs this time around is an
Anakin who can approach his part without any real reverence for
the material. You know, like how Harrison Ford in the first picture
refused to read most all of the lines Lucas wrote for him, and just
said what he himself would say in that situation. I wouldn't go
that far, but I certainly wouldn't read the part like I was reading
the Old Testament, like Liam, or like I was reading the ingredients
of a hot dog, like Jake. I would have fun with it, and bring a real
overdone bearing and presence to the role. I'm a great overactor.
Ian McDiarmid as Palpatine just acts rings around everyone else
in Jedi and Phantom Menace because he isn't afraid to just OOZE
evil. I can't say I'm an experienced actor by any standard but if
I was playing a role halfway between Jake Lloyd and James Earl Jones,
with a bit of Mark Hamill tossed in for old times' sake, you would
SEE those actors in my performance. I would make sure the audience
would be able to believe that I am really just an innocent kid,
three times as smart as I ought to be at my age but innocent nevertheless,
bit of an out-of-place British accent, but no worse than Liam, Carrie,
Ewan, Natalie, Peter Cushing, or anyone else in these silly movies.
I would be trying to find my place in the world, awkward and nervous,
very likeable but lost, all the possibilities of the world hidden
within. You would hear hints of Darth Vader's voice seep through
in the quiet moments. I would smile, and you would see the father
of Luke Skywalker there, just a farmboy, no more cultured than David Prowse.
SK: Do you have any acting experience? Do you think this matters
in casting this role, or are other qualities more important?
GG: [laughs] That sounds like something Lucas would ask. YES, for
god's sake, YES ACTING EXPERIENCE IS IMPORTANT! It doesn't matter
what people look like. Let me scream that from the rooftops. Well,
not now, but later, when I've rested my throat a bit. If the person
can't act the role, the movie fails. That's the only reason I don't
like the Phantom Menace -- most of the characters are pure cardboard.
Natalie and Pernilla actually seem to be trying. Ewan's been good
elsewhere, but his main character trait in the film seems to be
gaining and losing weight in the space between shots. Ahmed Best
is wonderfully physical, but his performance as Jar-Jar, which is
supposed to be kind of a laid-back character caring for his own
survival, Han Solo minus a few million brain cells, just rings to
flat it's hard to care about the character at all. The character
LOOKS good, and will sell action figures, but it's not well-acted
at all, because Best was a dancer, he was in STOMP, he didn't act.
And you can tell that onscreen, because it's a one-note performance.
He flails and jumps about because he can't get anyone to even notice
him otherwise, which for a character as visual as that is pretty
sad. He's not as bad as Jake Lloyd, but he's not going to win any
awards, that's for sure. As for me, I've done school plays and my
movies, because I don't know how to get hired anywhere otherwise.
I've never had a real audition anywhere. I've trained myself as
an actor, though, and I love Shakespeare. Cracking into Anakin would
be a great break. I think whoever does play Anakin should be a brilliant
actor, and a little odd, having that bit of a young Woody Allen
in him, able to look on what he's doing with some diatance rather
than being lost in all the blue-screened scenery. They should have
a strong voice, and, well, want to win an Oscar someday, if only
for editing. Heh. I want to see a good Anakin, George, you hear
that? You better not disappoint me. As if you cared about one single viewer, heh.
SK: What do you think of some of the other names tossed out for
the role of Anakin (DiCaprio, Jonathon Jackson, James van der Beek, etc.)?
GG: Lucas is not seriously considering any of those names from what
I hear. None of them would work, as can't act their way out of a
paper bag of Richard the Thirds, and don't even look like Mark Hamill.
DiCaprio's been good in other things and can actually almost act,
but if you recall "The Man in the Iron Mask," he isn't reliable
to act well in a bad movie, and the set of a Star Wars film is certainly
the set of a "bad movie." Onscreen we see a great movie, but onset
it's mostly boredom and chaos, and DiCaprio would fold in a second.
Actually I think Anakin should be someone who's done some directing,
for the stage or otherwise, because they know how to cope with delays
and confusion onset rather than becoming part of it, and not get
swallowed up by the almighty director, Lucas.
SK: When did you become interested in the role?
GG: The minute you mentioned it to me. Oops, should I say that?
I think it's just a funny idea, an utter jerk like me on the screen
of a Star Wars movie. I mean, can you imagine? I'd be more bizarre
than Jar Jar. I don't look bad, I mean I look like a Lucas picture
lead, but you'd get some weird laughs, I can tell you that. Especially
in the action scenes. The romance might work though, in an "Annie Hall" kind of way.
SK: What have you done, if anything, to get the attention of Lucasfilm?
GG: I've tried to send them Phantom Movie, but USC wouldn't give
me the real address. Maybe I should send it to the fake address.
I just want Lucas to see my picture. It's very naughty what it does
to his picture, but it's really goddamned funny and he might even
enjoy it. Other people in his team certainly would. As for my being
Anakin, I have no idea where to start. Why, do you know someplace
I should visit or write to? Hmm? HMMMM??
SK: Do you know of other non-professional actors that are also campaigning
for the role?
GG: I understand my Phantom Movie costars Justin Bielawa, Ben Sipprell
and David Ashe are also interested, along with James Van Der Beek and his dog.
SK: What do you think your chances are of being chosen for the part?
GG: Zero.
SK: What qualities do you think George Lucas is looking for when
casting Anakin? Do you believe you have these attributes?
GG: I think he's looking for people who would make a good action
figure, and I'm afraid I'd need an interesting costume first. I
do have a really nice voice. For putting into the digital talking chips on the figure, I guess.
SK: Do you think the Internet helps your chances at all? Many "Star
Wars" fans have made names for themselves through websites or movies
such as "Troops." Does this phenomenon increase your chances?
GG: See, the Internet doesn't help people win roles exactly, it
just helps spread jokes. And as a comedian, I adore this quality
of the Internet, which may be its main quality really. So yes, without
the Internet I would never have been taken seriously at all, and
now that I've been taken seriously the seriousness can end and those
Internet jokes and rumors can now begin. Especially once people
see and start quoting the Phantom Movie: "We must be mindful of
the liquor's force, my young padacake." "Wipe them out. Some of
them." "Random Lobster!" and so on and so on and so on back to the
original and highly controversial creation of the universe.
SK: Does it encourage you that Lucas is rumored to be casting an unknown?
GG: No, it depresses me, because an unknown could be anyone, especially
someone really awful who can't act. I do like unknowns a lot better
than easy-to-remember people from idiotic TV shows. Then again,
why couldn't Sarah Michelle Gellar play Anakin? Hey, I'd pay to
see that. I think most of us would.
SK: If you had to choose someone - besides yourself - to be Anakin, who
would it be?
GG: David Ashe.
SK: Anakin becomes romantically involved with Queen Amidala in "Episode
2." Is the chance to kiss Natalie Portman one of the reasons you're interested in the part?
GG: Not if Lucas was watching. [laughs] Hey, Annoying Bootlicker
never kissed Slapme Crunchberry in our picture either.
SK: Let's say your dream comes true and George Lucas whisks you off to
Skywalker Ranch to prepare for your new life as Anakin. How would you react?
GG: Very calmly. I'd laugh at how silly life is, and then e-mail
a few of my friends, because they at least never leak these things
to the press. Then I'd ask George a few silly questions about "Bridge
Over the River Kwai" and "The Hidden Fortress." Then argue over
what my costume would look like. And get fired on the eighth day
of shooting. And go home and start work on a parody of episode II ...