sent from: Paris, France. destination: Barnes, London, UK

This was my last chance to get what I wanted from George. It was the end of dailies, my last week on Star Wars: Episode III, and who knew when I’d ever see him again? (quite soon is the answer, story for another day). As the theatre cleared out, I stuck around, walked towards him nervously, Rick McCallum giving me the Evil Eye the whole time. “Uh? George? Hi.” My palms were sweaty, though I was trying so hard to be cool and casual. “Um, it’s my last week on the show, and I wanted to share this with you.” It was an old school exercise book, full of childhood drawings. “I’ve had this since I was 5 and…” George interrupted – “don’t tell me there’s something about Star Wars in there.” In that moment he wasn’t George Lucas icon or billionaire but ageing human being, being presented with an item an over 30-year old man had, saying it was from his childhood. If I fast fwd 30 years and I was still being presented with items from 30 years ago, about an idea I had once, I might wonder – where has the time gone? I don’t know if he felt that way, but he stood graciously as I took him through the pages to the one where I drew Darth Vader, Chewbacca and a Stormtrooper with the scrawl “today I played with the Star Wars figures my daddy brought me” George smiled and said how nice it was, and then wrote at the bottom of the page in his own scrawl – “May the Force be with you.”
Yesterday, 35 years ago, Star Wars stopped being George’s and became ours. Thank you, George, for that, and for your message to me.
May The Force Be With You, too!