logo Sign In

Post #1290271

Author
oojason
Parent topic
George Lucas: Star Wars Creator, Unreliable Narrator & Time Travelling Revisionist...
Link to post in topic
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/1290271/action/topic#1290271
Date created
25-Jul-2019, 12:55 PM

Mocata said:

doubleofive said:

Mocata said:

I was trying to find an interview with George that was in Empire magazine somewhere in the early 2000s. THX had just been released on DVD so it was a tie-in piece. So like, let’s say 2004. The interviewer asked him about the new changes to the film and the quote I want to say was something like…

“Oh it’s like Star Wars. There is no original version”.

Of course I could be mistaken and this is probably paraphrasing without remembering the actual question the journalist posed but the answer he gave stuck in my brain. I don’t own any copies of this magazine any more and I don’t think there’s a transcript online.

If you do find, this, let me know.

Edit: Possibly this one https://www.magazinecollectors.co.uk/empire-magazine-185-2004-johnny-depp-cover-p-6973.html

On Page 65 of the November 2004 edition of Empire magazine (UK), in an exclusive interview with George Lucas; titled ‘THX 2004’…

 

Interviewer: First the Star Wars Special Editions, now this… why keep fiddling?

George Lucas: All artists go back and change things, and with film it’s even more so, because you have more constraints. Any of the films I’ve re-worked later on are films that were never really finished. Either due to financial constraints, or time constraints, or technological constraints. I just wasn’t able to get my story out there complete. I always had to settle for less. So what I’ve done is I’ve gone back and said “Now I’m going to make this the way it was supposed to be”.

Interviewer: So only the Special Edition Star Wars films will ever be available?

George Lucas: Yeah, it’s the same thing with THX1138 - there is no original version now.
 

(also in the interview pages is a blown-up quote, in large red lettering, from George - “There is no ‘original version’ of Star Wars or THX 1338 now.”)

later in the interview…
 

Interviewer: Can you finally lay to rest rumours about Episodes VII, VIII & IX?

George Lucas: There is no VII, VIII, IX. There never has been. The story was originally intended to be IV, V & VI. But I had a back story which I found fascinating, and I decided to do the back story, [which] had already been written. So now you’ve got the full story from beginning to end. There really isn’t any more, [so] I’m gonna go and do other kinds of movies, which I’ve been looking forward to for a very long time.

 

There is more to the interview. I’ll give it a more thorough read through in the next day or so - and will hopefully fire up the old scanner too - and will post it up on here…
 

Edit:-

Page 64…

Page 65…

Page 66…