My trip to England and the set of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
"You've taken your first step into a larger world"
In 1979, when I was a freshman at college, I entered a contest sponsored by The Official Star Wars Club. The goal was to draw a humorous cartoon based on the characters from Star Wars. I sent in a cartoon in which Chewbacca tried to disguise himself as an Imperial Stormtrooper, and his fur was bulging out from the seams. I had absolutely no expectation of winning. I got a call from my home a few weeks later from my very excited mother. A telegram had arrived. “You won the contest!” she exclaimed. That was cool, I thought. “Which prize did I win?” I asked. I thought maybe I had won one of the lesser prizes, like a set of books or toys. “You won the grand prize!” she shouted. “You won a trip to England to be on the set of the sequel to Star Wars!” I was told later that George Lucas himself personally chose my cartoon as the winner from a group of ten finalists.
The story was covered in Bantha Tracks issue 5 (the newsletter of The Official Star Wars Club), Starlog issue 31 (which also included a picture of my runner-up entry for a pinball backglass design), as well as two Virginia newspapers. And the following entry appeared in a paperback book detailing the production of The Empire Strikes Back.
From Once Upon a Galaxy: A Journal of the Making of Star Wars The Empire Strikes Back by Alan Arnold, a Del Rey Book First Edition September 1980 Tuesday May 22 (1979) :
The Star Wars stage began its movie life today. The set that has been built on it depicts the huge hangar on Hoth. On this set are arranged the Rebel fleet of snowspeeders and the huge, full-scale Falcon. All the principals and hundreds of extras were on call today, and the two film units combined to work simultaneously. “Completing the soundstage is the culmination of seven months of planning, building, and set preparation,” said Kurtz. “And the result will be a permanent facility for filmmakers in England.” True, but nobody came to the opening. There had been talk of a press reception. Fox suggested asking Prince Charles. We thought of having R2-D2 open the mighty scenery doors by remote control. But nothing came of these suggestions. It was thought more prudent to get on with the work, bearing in mind we are behind schedule. But there was a visitor nonetheless – eighteen-old Matthew Pack (Note: they spelled my last name wrong) from Chester, Virginia, who had won a Star Wars Fan Club competition. His prize of a trip to London coincided with the stage’s opening day and he was overjoyed. Kersh was impressed, too. This stage is the largest interior he has ever worked on. “Of course, I’ve worked on bigger sets built on location, but this is by far the biggest interior,” he told me. “You might say that it’s reversing the trend in recent years of filmmakers going on location to achieve bigness. But outer space is colossal and where can you go to film that? You have to build to show the bigness of space.and that’s what we have done. But it’s a pity, I feel, that we didn’t open the stage with a fanfare. A movie stage, like a theater, is consecrated to make-believe. Who knows what shadow worlds will have brief lives on it over the years to come? Palaces and spacecraft, streets where no one lives, ships that sail no oceans, and jungles where birds don’t fly – all may have their day in this cavern of entertainment. But nobody except that boy from Virginia will remember the thrill of the first day.
For the thirtieth anniversary of The Empire Strikes Back a new lavish hardback was published in the fall of 2010 detailing the production of the film, and my visit was mentioned on page 161.
From The Making of The Empire Strikes Back by J.W. Rinzler, LucasBooks First Edition November 2010:
Because production was so far behind, plans to celebrate the stage’s opening - a press reception attended by Prince Charles, and so on - were dropped. One visitor did show up, however: 18-year-old Matthew Pak from Chester, Virginia, who had won a Star Wars Fan Club drawing competition. Another visitor was Charles Champlin from the Los Angeles Times, who wrote that the new structure was second in size only to the James Bond Stage at Shepperton: “Amid the busy jumble, crowning a slight rise of land like a dark castle, stands a huge and brand-new sound stage.”
I’m not exaggerating that Jack Magic has its roots in this wonderful life experience. It was there that I decided that I wanted to create a grand fantasy adventure of my own someday.
PUBLICITY PHOTOS FROM MY VISIT
This is me (Matt Pak) meeting Harrison Ford at the commisary. He was polite, friendly, articulate, a great guy. In fact, all of the cast and crew were terrific and never made us feel like intruders or in the way. The lady on the right was our tour guide.
Lunch with the cast. From left to right on the back: Peter Mayhew (cigarette in hand), Carrie Fisher, me, Mark Hammil, my mother Janet Pak, Harrison Ford. I apologize for not recalling the identities of the two people in front with their backs to the camera. The lady to Harrison Ford's left was our studio escort. The other man might be a journalist (note the small tape recorder next to his elbow).
Note that Peter Mayhew in the back still had black makeup around his eyes. He wore a non-articulated Chewbacca mask for the long shots, which saved him from having to undergo a full makeup session. My mother Janet got along great with Harrison Ford and Mark Hammil. She was particularly impressed that Mr. Ford said a quiet grace before he ate. Some of the hairdressers on the set thought that Janet was Mark Hammil's mother!
Here I am actually helping Carrie Fisher rehearse her lines for an upcoming scene in which she has to brief the rebel troopers about how to evacuate the transports from the planet Hoth. Carrie was not that much older they I was. Beautiful person. She asked me how many Planet of the Apes movies there were. I told her "five." She said something like "Holy $#%." I could tell she didn't want to make science fiction movies for the rest of her career.
Producer Gary Kurtz, Director Irving Kirschner, Janet Pak, and some skinny kid that used to be me.
Apparently I'm expressing something profound to Gary Kurtz while a camerman shoots footage of us for a documentary. The roll of paper in my hand has autographs of the cast and production staff.
Notice that I'm sticking out my tongue at Kenny Baker (R2D2). I swear I did not do that on purpose. I think the photographer caught me licking my lips and thought that this shot would be hilarious. Thanks a lot, dude.
Drawing I sketched in magic marker while on the ice cave hanger set. I'll bet you never knew that Harrison Ford had such a huge head.
This cartoon was comissioned by the Blacksburg Sun to accompany the article about me (written before the trip). Note that they mispelled my last name as “Pack.”
ADDRESSING THE RUMOR
For years there has been this rumor going around that I was somehow able to sneak away from my guides at Elstree Studio and carved my initials into a piece of styrofoam on the ice planet Hoth set. Teeny tiny letters scratched with a ball point pen, something like that.
Let me set the record straight for once and for all.
I did NOT just sneak off and carve my own initials into a piece of the Styrofoam of the ice hangar. Why would I do that? I'm not an egomaniac.
However, perhaps I was crazy enough to carve TWO different sets of initials and a heart shape.
Perhaps.