Star Wars: 10 Things You Might Not Know About Emperor Palpatine
9. He Was Portrayed By An Old Woman And A Chimpanzee
Since the release of the DVD special editions of the original Star Wars trilogy, Ian McDiarmid’s performance as the Emperor was edited into the Empire Strikes Back for a scene where he converse with Darth Vader about the identity of Luke Skywalker. The special edition also added additional dialogue referencing how it was Luke who destroyed the Death Star in A New Hope.
Despite the iconic portrayal by Ian McDiarmid in the role, he was not actually featured as the Emperor on screen until 1983’s Return of the Jedi. For the original appearance in 1980, George Lucas complied a series of different resources to create the look of the Emperor. The base was performed by actress Marjorie Eaton, who was age 79 at the time of the film’s release. Eaton was put under heavy makeup for the role and cast in shadow, due to not physically appearing on set alongside Vader and only being seen as a hologram.
While the disfigured look given by the makeup already gave a chilling appearance to the Emperor, Lucas went one step further and superimposed the eyes of a Chimpanzee over Eaton’s eyes; this gave the Emperor a much less human feel. Finally, actor Clive Revill was cast to voice the Emperor. Originally for Return of the Jedi, Lucas had wanted McDiarmid to emulate the voice of Revill, however the original voice created by McDiarmid was ultimately use for the final cut of the film.