Size Matters Not: The Extraordinary Life and Career of Warwick Davis (29 page)

Chapter Fifteen

The Little Menace

With Jake Lloyd (aka Anakin Skywalker) on the ferry back from Tunisia after filming the Tatooine scenes for
The Phantom Menace
.

 

Holding a fuel pipe while badgering George for a part in yet another scene.

 

Courtesy of Lucasfilm Ltd.

 

Me as Wald, Anakin’s best pal.

 

Courtesy of Lucasfilm Ltd.

 

The now infamous “Willow scene.”

 

Courtesy of Lucasfilm Ltd.

 

Rumors had been circulating for years about a new
Star Wars
film. I’d used every available chance to drop every kind of hint I could think of to George Lucas, old buddy, old pal, dear friend – usually by fax – to let him know that I would make myself available if and when filming commenced.

Whenever I spoke to George I’d always say something like: “For goodness’ sake, when are you going to make another
Star Wars
movie?”

And all he would say was: “Soon, Warwick. Soon.”

So yes, some people have since said that
The
Phantom Menace
was my fault.

Not long after the phone call, a letter arrived postmarked Skywalker Ranch. George had given me the part of Wald, Anakin Skywalker’s best friend.

“Excellent!”

Anakin is the central character in
Phantom Menace
, the kid who goes on to become Darth Vader, so I reckoned that as his best friend I’d have a lot of screen time. It would also mean that we’d be very, very close at long, long last to paying back the tax man.

One of the downsides, of course, was that as my character was a youngster I wouldn’t get to play with a light saber or laser guns and the chances of killing any Stormtroopers would be remote. I didn’t mind, I was just delighted to be in the new
Star Wars
movie.

Wald was a little green alien with saucer eyes, antennae, and a froglike skin. As I shared none of those physical characteristics, this meant I would have to wear a rubber head. I sighed. I’d come a long way since
Jedi
but now here I was, about to go back into yet another rubber head. Oh well, I’d asked for it, I suppose.

But George was way ahead of me, of course. He called me and said he felt bad about giving me the role of a masked character and he’d found something else for me to do as a humanoid background character. So I showed up at Leavesden Studios extremely excited. George was there and told me I’d be filming a scene from the pod race with the second unit.

I headed over to makeup where the hair designer, who shall remain nameless, looked me up and down and said, “You need hair extensions.”

“Fair enough,” I thought, and took a seat where for several hours many hair extensions were glued onto my hair with a waxy, rubbery substance. When she’d finished I stared at the mirror. I looked like a tramp who’d spent a night sleeping in a hedge full of angry badgers.

“Oh yes,” I said, in the tone of a man who had made the mistake of telling a young high street hairdresser to do whatever they wanted, “I can see what you’ve done here, yes, it’s good. Excellent. Yes. Um.”

Once in costume, suitably attired for a day at the space races, I dashed off and found the stage, just in time to start shooting scenes from Anakin’s pod race.
^a

“What’s Willow doing here?” a production assistant asked.

“What do you mean?”

“You’re dressed as Willow, are they making a sequel? This is the stage for
Star Wars Episode I
,
^b
you know.”

It was true. I hadn’t realized until then but I looked like an older, scruffier version of Willow – albeit a version who hadn’t washed his hair for a few years. Sure enough, by the time the film came to be edited the scene became known as the “Willow shot.”

Interestingly (for the gee–, sorry, fans), this link was expanded upon and, as an April Fool joke,
StarWars.com
ran a story saying that
Willow
had been absorbed into the
Star Wars
universe. It worked well because there are various similarities between the two films. They both have a lead character with great imagination and hidden potential (Luke and Willow) and a lovable rogue-turned-hero (Han Solo and Madmartigan). Also Skywalker is the English translation of the Sanskrit word “Daikini,” which is the name of the “human” species in Willow. But as far as I know there are no plans to merge the two . . . yet.

In the “Willow shot” we were supposed to be watching a pod race and making bets on the outcomes. A mass of enormous studio lights were used to replicate the blinding suns of Tatooine and aircraft propellers to simulate the backdraft of the pods as they raced by. The actors had to picture the pod race happening right in front of them and I also had to imagine I was seated next to Watto, a CGI character (he’s the greedy Toydarian secondhand goods seller who “owns” Anakin, his mother, and C-3PO).

Now, as we were in a sports stadium watching a pod race, it made sense that there were various alien beings selling snacks and drinks. As the cameras began to roll, a girl came into view with space-age-looking crisps (I think they were Walkers with a blob of food coloring on them) and a weird gloopy fruit juice. It was served in intergalactic Tupperware, the same sort of beakers and plates used by Luke when he’s having dinner with his family on Tatooine in
Episode IV
.

We were supposed to look full of anticipation, excited at the prospect of a great race, and then we had to leap up as the race began. As the crisps came past, I thought “Why not?” and grabbed a handful and then took some juice to wash them down.

“Cut! That was great, let’s go again, everyone!”

Because it was a special-effects shot, numerous takes of us performing exactly the same actions were required. So six large handfuls of crisps and a couple of pints of space juice later, I started feeling rather ill. I’d also managed to develop a very painful migraine, thanks to the extremely bright and hot studio lights. After the seventh take, I shut my eyes and leaned backward in my chair in an effort to ease my aching head and a growing feeling of nausea.

Someone was tapping on my foot. Where was I? Who on earth would be tapping my foot? I opened one eye. Oh, cock! It was George. This was my first day on the movie and I’d fallen asleep. Twenty years of pestering and this was how I showed my gratitude.

I decided to play it cool and stayed just as I was, leaning back in my chair.

“Hiya, George, just resting my eyes from the bright lights.”

George’s eyes twinkled. I could tell he knew.

“I was snoring, wasn’t I?”

I wondered how I always managed to do this. I always tried to be on my best behavior around George but I always managed to embarrass myself. It had happened on the set of
Willow
. Daniel and I had been regaling the crew with a story about how a few days earlier I’d been stranded in one of the Portaloos in total darkness without any toilet paper and I’d had to yell out of the window for help. Daniel got very graphic and quite rude and despite my best efforts to get him to shut up he had continued, blissfully unaware that George was standing right behind him. Luckily (on both occasions) George didn’t seem to be offended.

After we’d wrapped, I went back to the changing room and spent an hour wrestling with the hair extensions.

I found a passing makeup artist. “Excuse me, could you help?” I pleaded.

After another few minutes of wrangling she gave up. “I don’t think they’re meant to come out,” she said suddenly, and then quickly left the room.