10 Actors Who Hated Working On Star Wars
Money isn't everything.
Like most blockbuster movie franchises, Star Wars is such a massive entertainment goliath that it doesn't really give actors much room for their own agency.
For the most part, they need to just roll with the creative tide given the sheer number of moving parts that go into shooting even the most basic scene, where revisions require time-consuming and expensive adjustments.
As such it's not terribly surprising that many cast members have expressed their distaste for working on the franchise over the years, whether a result of poor working conditions, bad pay, disappointing creative decisions, or the less-pleasant quarters of the fanbase.
Though many of these actors earned enormous wealth and fame as a result of George Lucas' sci-fi franchise, artistic and spiritual fulfilment is much harder to come by, as evidenced by these 10 actors freely discussing their frustrations with being a part of it.
At least for some they've got the comfort of lifelong residuals to soften the blow, though sadly not everyone was sufficiently compensated for their work if these stories are to be believed...
10. Terrence Stamp (Supreme Chancellor Valorum)
The Star Wars prequels are absolutely packed with terrific actors who were thoroughly wasted on George Lucas' experimental blockbuster trilogy, and few more egregiously than the brilliant Terrence Stamp.
He makes a brief cameo appearance in The Phantom Menace as Supreme Chancellor Finis Valorum, who is ultimately booted out of the Senate and replaced with Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid).
In an interview with Empire magazine, Stamp didn't have many kind words to say about shooting his small role, nor working with George Lucas:
"We didn't get on at all...I didn't rate him that much as a director, really. I didn't feel like he was a director of actors; he was more interested in stuff and effects. He didn't interest me and I wouldn't think I interested him...I came all the way back from Australia to do it. I didn't want to but my agent leaned on me and I wanted to meet Natalie Portman because I'd seen her in [Leon]. And I did meet her and she was absolutely enchanting.
But on the day I'm supposed to do my scene with her, for which I'd travelled halfway around the world, I said, 'Where's Natalie?' And George says, 'That's Natalie,' and points to a bit of paper on the wall. It was just boring."
In addition to having little chance to flex his acting muscles in the role, Stamp also claimed the pay was poor, and that when he agreed to come back for a day of unpaid reshoots on the condition he receive a gift instead, he ended up getting...a set of Star Wars stencils.