Robert Englund Repeats ‘Star Wars’ Story Nixed by Mark Hamill
A Nightmare on Elm Street star Robert Englund repeated a story about Star Wars that Mark Hamill had shot down in the past.
Englund, known for playing the Freddy Krueger character, has previously said he played a significant part in helping Hamill land the role of Luke Skywalker, while Hamill has insisted it’s not true.
“Mark Hamill was my roommate and I said to him, ‘You know, George Lucas is doing another movie and you might be right for this’,” Englund said in a recent episode of the Inside of You Podcast (available below). “Freddy Krueger told Luke Skywalker to call his agent and he got the part. His agent hates me telling this story, because she insists that she already submitted him for the part.”
The story has circulated for several years – but Hamill denied major parts of it in a 2018 tweet tagged “setting the record straight.” He said: “Robert was one of several actors who told me about Star Wars… When I told my agent she'd already set up an audition.” He added that the agent “still gets annoyed” when Englund “takes the credit,” and addressed the suggestion he’d been living with the other actor at the time. “Sleeping on his couch is nonsense! I'd been a working actor for over six years & had my own apartment.”
In the new interview, Englund recounted how he’d failed to land a role in Apocalypse Now, but was taken to another production office afterwards. “Somebody then walked me across from the Apocalypse Now audition, and were like, ‘You might be right for someone here’,” he said. “[T]hey brought me over to the Star Wars audition. I don’t even think it was called Star Wars then. They took my polaroid – like a mugshot, profile and full face – and I think it was for the Han Solo role.”
At that point, he added, the Solo character was being planned as “an older uncle, the kind of guy that brings a joint to Thanksgiving and gets all the kids high; the cool, older uncle.” He suggested he hadn’t been too disappointed in not being hired, reporting he was “just excited because I just love George Lucas.”
Watch Robert Englund on ‘The Inside of You Podcast’
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