Peter Cushing was in a lot of films before Star Wars, especially the Hammer Frankenstein and Dracula movies. He was one of those character actors who was in a lot of crap sometimes but always gave a good performance and treated the material he was in with respect, a la Christopher Lee. Its weird, but seeing him never takes me out of the movie. He’s that good.
Him and Alec are probably the exception for SW movies which is why even if people knew them from other movies it didn’t necessarily pull them out of the experience as they were actually great actors that portrayed the character well and made them believable to watch. This is why I fear for Emilia and Woody being in this movie…unless they are directed well and really pull of a good performance, it’s going to be hard not to just see Khaleesi from GOT and Woody from Zombieland joy riding in the Millenium Falcon…
.Val