Some Interesting Facts About Star Wars

1.

It's original title was "Adventures of Luke Starkiller as taken from the Journal of the Whills, Saga I: The Star Wars". It was eventually shortened.

2.

Star Wars is the most successful movie related toy line ever with 250 million action figures sold between 1978 and 1986

3.

Frank Oz, the actor who voiced Yoda, also voiced Miss Piggy on the Muppets

4.

The sound of Darth Vader's labored breathing was achieved using a scuba regulator.

5.

George Lucas was diagnosed with hypertension and exhaustion as a result of filming Star Wars

6.

Every Star Wars movie in the United States has been released in May, one week after George Lucas's birthday

7.

John Williams won an Oscar for the Star Wars soundtrack. The American Film Institute later named it the greatest film score of all time.

8.

Chewbacca was based on George Lucas' dog, Indiana. His dog is also the inspiration for the name Indiana Jones.

9.

The Millennium Falcon was inspired by the shape of a hamburger with and olive in its side.

10.

The character of Han Solo was based on Lucas's friend Francis Ford Coppola, the director of The Godfather.

11.

It took up to 10 puppeteers using both hands to operate Jabba the Hut

12.

Mark Hamill, the actor who played Luke Skywalker, damaged his face in a car accident following primary shooting which made reshoots impossible.

13.

It took 3 actors to portray Darth Vader. James Earl Jones did the voice, Sebastian Shaw was his face, and David Prowse was his body.

14.

After discovering that the 20th Century Fox special effects department was shutdown just prior to filming, George started his own company known as Industrial Light And Magic.

15.

Al Pacino and Christopher Walken were also considered for the role of Han Solo.

16.

R2-D2 is named after a piece of film editor's jargon. It means "reel 2, dialog 2".

17.

The Ewok were name after the Miwok, a Native American tribe indigenous to the location where the Endor scenes were filmed.

18.

The word Ewok isn't mentioned in the film at all.

19.

George Lucas was famous for using words from non-English languages to name things. Yoda means "warrior" in Sanskrit and Darth Vader is named after the Dutch word for "father".

20.

Peter Mayhew, the actor who played Chewbacca, was 7'2" 2.2 meters

21.

Steven Spielberg was Lucas's first choice to direct Return of the Jedi but he was part of the Director's Guild which Lucas had left on bad terms so Steven was forbidden from taking the role.

22.

Of the asteroids in Empire Strikes Back, one is a shoe and another is actually a potato.

23.

Originally, the force was going to be some sort of "Galactic Holy Grail" named the Kyber Crystal.

24.

Also, Luke and his family were originally imagined as dwarves.

25.

Perhaps the silliest sounding role was Han Solo who was meant to be a green skinned monster who had a set of gills and no nose.