Ya can’t make this stuff up, folks!
The ideas were all right but I’m not sure that they belonged in the same room. What was interesting to me was that Lucas started talking about Star Wars as if it was a real world. He said things like “Well, you know Han Solo is married to a Wookiee. but we can’t say that.” Now that was 20 years ago [in 1998], so my memory may be wrong. [As outrageous as Ripps’s recollection sounds, there is evidence supporting it. Pat Proft corroborates it and an early draft of the Star Wars script (January 28, 1975) has Han Solo living with a furry female creature who he kisses. Proft also remembers learning that Han was raised by Wookiees, which is verified on pages 46 & 131 of Laurent Bouzereau’s Star Wars: The Annotated Screenplays.]
Apparently, there were plans to make it a rock musical!
It definitely would have had more rock ‘n’ roll in the same way that Robin Phillips is more rock ‘n’ roll, it’s just crazier. It needn’t have been loud, grungy stuff, but it would have been much more contemporary and much simpler. I like really simple music tracks. I think it would have turned out to be much better.
The show’s primary director has this to say about the opening sequence which is several eternities of nothing but wookiees talking to one another:
I recently watched the show for the first time in 19 years and I was kind of blown away by all the production value, and I was saying to myself: “Did I shoot that?” I felt that a lot of the communication by the Wookiees really kind of worked. You can really understand what is going on just by their expressions.
Drugs’re bad, m’kay?
Speaking of drugs:
Gee, ya think?
There’s more, a lot more. I’ll say this much for George, at least he can admit that the Star Wars Holiday Special was a steaming pile of fetid dingo kidneys.
