At this point I think we had all figured that Disney had at least reached out to the stars of the original Star Wars trilogy to see if they would be interested in reprising their roles, but in an interview with ET about his new movie Sushi Girl, Mark Hamill is surprisingly upfront about where things ar at with negotiations. “They’re talking to us,” he reveals. “George [Lucas] wanted to know whether we’d be interested. He did say that if we didn’t want to do it, they wouldn’t cast another actor in our parts – they would write us out. … I can tell you right away that we haven’t signed any contracts. We’re in the stage where they want us to go in and meet with Michael Arndt, who is the writer, and Kathleen Kennedy, who is going to run Lucasfilm." So nothing signed yet. This conflicts somewhat with recent reports that Harrison Ford had in fact officially signed on to once again play Han Solo, because although Hamill is only speaking for himself here, he does go on to say that he would be quicker to sign if he knew his co-stars ("Carrie and Harrison and Billy Dee and Tony Daniels, everybody that’s around from the original") were also on board.
So what about story details? Again, we have unconfirmed reports that the plot will focus on the offspring of the original characters, and Hamill - although he says he's only guessing - holds to that.
“I’m assuming that these movies would be about our offspring — like my character would be sort of in the Obi-Wan range [as] an influential character". He also reveals that he is with most fans when it comes to wanting less of a reliance on CGI in the new films.
“I hope they find the right balance of CGI with practical effects", says Hamill.
"I love props, I love models, miniatures, matte paintings — I’m sort of old school. I think if you go too far in the direction of CGI it winds up looking like just a giant a video game, and that’s unfortunate. … If they listen to me at all, it’ll be, ‘Lighten up and go retro with the way it looks.”
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Mark Cassidy is a writer, photographer, amateur filmmaker, and Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic from Dublin, Ireland.