Interview with Craig Miller on Star Wars Fan Relations

This is Craig Miller, director of Star Wars Fan

Relations, and you are inside the 12 months of

Star Wars, only on Studio 2009. Welcome to another

GeekCast Radio Presents interview. This time

for GeekCast Radio and Studio 2009. I am of course,

TF2 and Mike. Joining me as always in the Studio

2009 12 Months Star Wars series is Mr. Dave Draper.

Hello sir, how are you? Hello, I'm all right,

how are you? Pretty good, pretty good. Today

we have the most impressive... Opportunity to

talk with Mr. Craig Miller, director of Star

Wars Fan Relations. Craig is much more than that,

though. He is a film producer, advertiser, and

writer. Hi, Craig. How are you? I'm okay. How

are you guys? Pretty good, pretty good. I am

there. Yep, yep. And we've got a lot of questions

for Mr. Miller because we have read both of his

books, Star Wars Memories and More Moving Memories,

and... Wow, I haven't read that much of like

I read books, but I don't I don't read the That

was like close to a thousand pages It's been

a long time since I've read a thousand pages

But it was awesome. Both of them were amazing

and we have a bunch of questions for you and

Dave's gonna kick it off Yeah, well first of

all Because a lot of our readers might not have

read those books yet we were gonna ask you about

your background a little and how that got you

into Lucasfilm and What the effect of being at

Lucasfilm kind of had? to set the trajectory

of the rest of your career? I'll take that as

being the question. This was 1976. I was just

graduating from college. And I had been all of

my life a big comic book, science fiction, movie,

geek, fan, nerd, and through local science fiction

fandom, I'd met Charlie Lippincott, who was,

as you guys probably know, running Star Wars

Corporation, which was the marketing, licensing,

promotion side of Star Wars and Lucasfilm. And

Charlie knew that there wasn't any good traditional

way to market Star Wars. Today, every other movie

is science fiction or superheroes. Back in the

70s, people thought science fiction was stupid.

It was for little kids. It wasn't anything serious

people went to see. The actors in Star Wars were

not famous. Mark Carey Harrison had the very

beginnings of their careers. They hadn't been

stars of anything. And even Peter Cushing and

Alec Guinness were thought of by Americans, if

they were thought of at all, as being character

actors in a lot of British detective and horror

movies. So they weren't thought of as big stars.

And the way you marketed in the 70s was you got

interviews and magazines and you got your stars

booked on talk shows like the Tonight Show and

no one was going to book Mark, Carrie or Harrison.

So Charlie came up with the idea of marketing

the film directly to the target audience, which

is science fiction fans. He knew about fandom,

but he was not part of fandom. And so we had

met and as part of his explorations into fandom.

And I ended up consulting with him that summer

in 1976 on how to market Star Wars to fans. And

we stayed in contact with my consulting through

the next year. And after Star Wars came out and

was a big hit, I was hired to come to Lucasfilm

full -time as part of the publicity team under

the title of Director of Fan Relations. Very

cool, very cool. So just out of curiosity, because

neither of us have been to a movie studio to

watch a film at all in our lifetimes, but was

there a difference? in getting to watch the film

at the studio it was made, like that first time

you're first seeing the film, just seeing it

at the studio. Was there a difference for you

versus going to a movie theater and seeing a

movie like that? Like, did it have more, was

there more, quote unquote, privilege to it because

it was a special thing? Well, yeah, I mean, sure.

Especially remember, I wasn't a jaded career

film director. you know, person, filmmaker, whatever

you want to call it. You know, I had been to

movie studios a couple of times, you know, but

not in any official capacity. So just the whole

experience of going to the studio. Uh, which

was 20th century fox and going into a screening

room and this was a screening room filled with

people and seeing star wars. I first saw it I

don't know exactly Two three weeks before it

opened even then it wasn't quite completely finished

but you know, but it was as close to finished

as You know, there was nothing noticeably unfinished

and so It was it added excitement To the event

but you know star I don't know that Star Wars

would have needed anything extra to sell me Like

so many people but especially as someone who

had a lifelong love of science fiction that opening

scene you know with the blockade runner and the

and Star Destroyer Coming on screen and coming

on screen and coming on screen by the end of

that scene the movie had me It was just amazing.

Yeah, you mentioned in that chapter of my first

viewing, you talked about how emotional your

reaction was to seeing the completed film for

the first time. Was there any other moments at

Lucasfilm that had kind of a similar impact?

Oh, gosh. Yes and no. I mean, it's going to London

and going on stage into the ice cave and seeing

the full -size Millennium Falcon and the X -Wings

and everything. That was from the science fiction

kid. It was just amazing. Between seeing that

screening of Star Wars and going on to that stage

was about two years. So I, you know, I've been

on a lot of other movie lots and seen other things

filming, but, you know, Star Wars had become

such an important part of my life and it was

such an amazing, I mean, we all know it was an

amazing film. So then to be on the stage with

all of that stuff surrounding you, you know,

that was just amazing. The first time I got to

operate R2 -D2, Which was Sesame Street, right?

Which was, yeah, on Sesame Street. We did five

segments that went into different episodes of

Sesame Street. You know, getting to operate R2

was terrific. I mean, who doesn't love R2? Yeah.

Only heretics don't love R2 because yikes. And

everyone makes fun of me for liking the scene

in Revenge of the Sith. It's either, is it Revenge

or is it Attack? Whenever he starts flying, I'm

like, ooh, yay, we get to actually see R2 doing

stuff beyond the normal awesome stuff that he

did in the original trilogy. I was like, R2 can

fly. That's awesome. Everybody makes fun of me

because I like that stuff. Oh, boy, that's what

it is. I was just going to quickly interject

that I kind of I know what you're saying because

I got to go to Disney World last year. And at

Galaxy's Edge, walking in and seeing the life

size Falcon was, you know, really kind of a big

deal for a lifelong Star Wars fan. Yeah, I mean,

it would be, it should be, and they know that.

That's why it's sitting there in the middle of

a giant courtyard so you can get that full effect.

Yeah. Absolutely. Good old Disney World. Gotta

love it. So, your books are filled with fascinating

anecdotes and personal stories. Can you share

any particular memorable or surprising experience

that didn't make it into either of the books,

unless you're already working on a third book?

No, no, I'm not working on a third book like

those. Between the two books, there's over 200

,000 words, 800 some pages. That's an awful lot

of stuff to remember. I don't know what story

I could tell you that isn't part of that. Obviously,

we all have things we do in our life. I went

to the supermarket and I bought eggs. I tell

stories that I hope are entertaining and are

amusing or interesting, but there's a lot of

what happens between all those stories that,

you know, it may be Star Wars, but it was still

going to work every day. Right. You know, there

was still deadlines to meet. And sometimes you

have to deal with people who you don't care that

much for, care that much for or want to deal

with. But, you know, work requires that. So.

It's nice that I was working on something wonderful

and magical and for the most part, working with

people I really liked. Speaking of the people

you worked with, you offer a lot of glimpses

into how guys like George Lucas and Charles Lippincott

worked. Was there any other insights or observations

you can share about them or other notable figures

you encountered at Lucasfilm? Well, I worked

with George, Charlie, of course, for the first...

Year, year and a half was my direct boss until

he left. Gary Kurtz I worked with extensively.

Gary became a good friend and we worked together

on a lot of movies over the next 40 years until

he unfortunately passed away. But he was great.

He was always surprising. Gary always came across

as very serious and solemn, but he did have a

joking silly side to him. I tell that story about

the impromptu prank we played on Mark Hamill

in Star Wars Memories, which just surprised everyone.

I mean, do you want me to tell that story? No,

people need to read the book. That was funny,

but people need to read the book. When I was

reading both books and this is a side to what

my next question is gonna be but when I was reading

both of them like This is why I love reading

because I'm reading somebody's story that I've

never that I'd never experienced thought I would

ever That's why I love autobiographies because

they're from a time that No one would really

know like none of us who are younger than the

new you are obviously sir and stuff like that's

like That is so cool. Like, listen, we'll get

to the offices, but like all your office moves

and stuff like that. I was like, oh, that is

so cool. He got to do various things at each

different location and everything else. And it's

just, it's a nice look back in time. And I think

everybody needs to read more autobiographies

of people that are older than them, that people

that had adventures and things from those 60s,

70s, 80s, 90s, whatever, because. It's a nice

little snippet of history. Well, and I also think

it's interesting because like I'm a fan I've

been a fan since I was 76 years old But like

it's from a fan's perspective, you know, you

were working at Lucasfilm But you also went in

as a fan. Whereas a lot of times, you know There's

the famous William Shatner get a life been on

Saturday night live because he was it was a job

It was a job for these guys. Whereas you're a

fan in the heart of something that fandom is

like, oh my God, it had to be amazing kind of

in a way. Yeah. And you're absolutely right.

It was, I mean, it was a job, but you know, it's

that saying a kid in a candy store. I was there

working, but I was doing stuff and associating

with. people and things I never dreamed I would

do. I grew up in Los Angeles, but my family wasn't

in the entertainment industry. I never thought

I'd be in the entertainment industry. I wasn't

an actor. I didn't want to be a director. I didn't

have any thought about, oh, I'll end up in the

movie business. part of my imagining. So it was

amazing. It was dealing with people who I never

thought I'd deal with, doing things, flying to

different countries and being on movie sets and

locations and going to premieres and all that

kind of stuff. It's nice to have a job where

you get to do cool, fun things. It wasn't only

cool, fun things. But it's nice when you can

sometimes do cool fun things. Yeah, absolutely.

You provide a detailed account of the challenges

in securing studio approval for Star Wars, including

the role of market research. In your opinion,

how has the film industry's approach to market

research and audience feedback evolved since

when you were doing it? OK, well, I never did

the market research, but. Fox had a market research

department, and I'm sure studios still do, and

they make sense. But, you know, as I mentioned

in the book, one of my degrees is in social psychology.

Social psychology is in part things like market

research and testing and studying opinion, polling,

all that kind of stuff. The people at Fox did

that mostly valid research, but they asked the

wrong people the wrong questions. It's the way

they tested movies, not the part where they show

it to them and what did you think of it, but

the sort of advanced testing they do. What they

did on Star Wars was primarily two things. Here's

a list of types of movies comedy drama war Western

mystery romance Science fiction was on the list.

They asked people, you know, which of these are

you most interested in? Which of these are you

least interested in they also gave give them

lists of titles What does this title suggest

to you? Does this title sound interesting to

you like it'd be a movie you'd want to see? Valid

questions to ask, but they are limited in scope.

Plus, what they did is they went out to Hollywood

Boulevard, which in LA, even back in the 70s,

was a sort of middle level street with many movie

theaters, but not huge amounts of traffic. And

they asked them these questions in the middle

of the afternoon. Well, these were not people

who were likely to go see a science fiction movie.

So when they asked them those questions, science

fiction was one of the bottom two or three types

of movies people wanted to see. And no one understood

what Star Wars as a title meant. Science fiction

wasn't a thing. We were still in Vietnam. You

hear Star Wars. People were going. I don't know

what that is. Is it about Vietnam? Is it about

movie stars in Vietnam? They didn't know what

was going on. So it's not it's not really that

market research is bad. It's just it wasn't handled

well. You can do good market research, but it

has to be done carefully and thoughtfully. You

know, the advice Fox got was don't make a science

fiction movie And if you do make this movie,

change the title, no one will go see a movie

called Star Wars. Well, and the whole industry

kind of was changing at that time, too, wasn't

it? Because Jaws was the first summer blockbuster,

and Jaws was the first film that said, hey, these

teenagers, they got a lot of money. They want

something to do during the summer. And Star Wars

sort of came along and cemented that. But the

industry was changing, and who was going to see

movies was changing. They hadn't caught up yet.

Yeah, to a great extent, that's true. Jaws was

absolutely the first big blockbuster. Summer

was thought of as a time that kids went to movies,

adults didn't go to movies, adults went on vacation.

You know, wasn't a good time to release movies.

So Jaws, then Star Wars, and then really from

Star Wars, a lot of places said, OK, Because

the movie industry will take one instance and

say this is a trend and go that direction. You

know, it's like Star Wars opened in the end of

May, which was before the previously held thought

of as to when summer started. Now summer is starting

in the beginning of May with movie releases.

And yeah, absolutely. It's thought it's also

not thought of necessarily as just. kids, but

people want to see something exciting, something

adventurous, something that will take them out

of their normal day -to -day. I mean, Star Wars

was very groundbreaking like that. Is there anything

that you're working on now? that you can see

anything that you've heard of or anything in

the horizon that might ever have that kind of

effect again? 40 years from now, everyone's talking

about this movie. It's so hard to predict anything

like that. When we were doing Star Wars, the

thought was, we think this movie will be successful,

which means it'll make enough money that we'll

be able to make a sequel. Maybe a low -budget

sequel but you know that was that was as far

as Success was taking us being able to make a

sequel real success would be a full -budget sequel

Yeah, you know Alan Dean Foster's splinter in

the mind's eye First Star Wars read novel was

written with the idea that it could be the low

-budget sequel Fewer locations, fewer characters,

that kind of thing. Luke and Leia weren't siblings

yet? A lot of things hadn't happened yet. Yeah.

Well, there's a moment in that book where, yeah,

they weren't siblings yet. No, no. Well, I mean,

they wouldn't necessarily have followed the book

exactly, but... No. Well, I mean, famously, like

he... One of the interesting things about the

writing process is how people think that just

because you've got an idea, it's written in stone

the whole way through. In fact, you bring this

up, that Lucas himself told you that he was changing

his plans after he turned the jet. People think

that because Lucas had a plan, it was the plan

and he never changed anything. The original script

was Leia was the hero rescuing Luke and Han was

a weird alien. Stuff is very fluid until it's

actually in front of you. Things change. There's

a lot of mythos around the origins of Star Wars,

some of which were fostered by George, but that

aren't really accurate. Did he have an idea for

many more movies? Yes. Was it exactly like this?

No. Lots of stuff changed over time. Yeah. That's

what happens. Time changes everything. Yeah.

All right, so I've got two little small questions

here because I've been over my lifetime moving

various places and having I usually use my living

room as my office for the most part. So you've

had many different office spaces in your career,

which was the best and the worst location for

your work style. Or did you adapt to where you

were working out of? Oh, you you know, you always

you always adapt. Nothing's forever. And you

do you go with what are required when I started

at Lucasfilm. Lucasfilm originally was in an

office in Universal Studios on the Universal

Studios lot. And we kept that office for many

years, but the company quickly outgrew it. So

when I joined, while the company still had that

office, the publicity and licensing side of things.

We're working in an office about, I don't know,

half a mile or so a mile away off the lot. We

were in a doctor's medical suite in a small building,

all doctors' offices. And my first desk was in

the reception area. We had a receptionist who

at the time was Mick Garris who's gone on to

a great career as a director. But Mick was our

receptionist. I had another desk in the reception

area just because that was the only place available.

Charlie had the doctor's office as his office

and we had a couple of other people in in different,

what would have been exam rooms if there were

still doctors there. And after a month or two,

my duties expanded and I was given one of the

exam rooms for my office because I had more needs

than just a desk. And I was having people in

for meetings and stuff. You know and so it changes

and We were there for I don't know a year and

then we moved to We got rid of that building

or that office and we moved into offices Universal

had taken over there was a motel across the street

from universe studios, big motel, two stories,

lots of wings. But, you know, it was probably

a hundred rooms, maybe something like that. They

had taken over that and converted them to offices.

And so we moved into the motel and we all had

we had a row of offices in the motel. It was

interesting because now because they all used

to be sleeping rooms, like in a motel or hotel,

we all had our own private bathroom. That's right.

And eventually we bought a building, the Olson

Brothers Egg Farm, which was Rebuilt and converted

into the Lucasfilm building which we called the

egg company and for a while we moved into office

trailers in the parking lot of the egg company

while the final stages of the Remodeling was

going on and we moved into the egg company building.

Did you ever have your ultimate geek out office

space? Besides what you currently have at home.

Yeah boy Well, I you know, I don't know what

you mean geek out I mean, all my offices are

surrounded by, are filled with stuff I love.

Artwork and posters. I tell a story in the book

when we were in the egg company where they had

a decorator who was going from office to office

decorating it for people. And I got tired because

we had a lot of offices and I finally just hung

stuff up in my office. because I didn't want

empty walls until figuring until they got around

to my office. And then when we change it, when

they when they did get to my office, they looked

around and said, this is great. Just keep this

stuff. But one of the things I had was I was

I'm a huge fan of George's first picture, THX

1138. And there was a special poster done for

it. heavy foil, you know, full size movie poster,

but done on a heavy foil. And it's just a headshot

of one of the Chrome robots from the movie and

it says THX 1138. And that's all it says on it.

And I had managed, I won't go into the whole

story, it's in the book, but I managed to get

literally the last 10 existing of those posters

from the printer. because I wanted one of those

printed posters and so I tracked down where they

got printed and they said if you take all of

them we'll give you one and so I did and so I

had one framed and I put it up in my office and

George came into my office one day and just stared

at that poster and he said where did you get

that poster? I don't have one of those. And I

said, it's my favorite poster. I love it. I love

the movie. But I have a duplicate if you want

one. And I got out one of my duplicates and I

sent it up to George up in Marin. And it's been

hanging up in the Lucasfilm offices ever since.

It's moved around a couple of times. It was in

the library. It's been hanging in the archives.

But, you know, so having posters and artwork

around and photographs has always been something

I've done wherever I've had offices. Yeah. That's

my favorite story from the book about the poster.

So as a director, as the director of fan relations,

you had a pretty, you know, first -hand perspective

of the early fan community, how did you navigate

those challenges and rewards of managing a non

-existent to a rabidly passionate fan base? Well,

I guess it helped that I was already connected

to fandom, part of fandom, and to some extent

known in fandom because I was involved with like

putting on conventions and stuff, a lot of people

knew of me or knew me. So I wasn't this, I was

going to say some weird guy. I was a weird guy.

I was one of our weird guys, but I wasn't someone

in an office in a suit somewhere. I was part

of fandom and so I could deal with people. knowing

where they're coming from, knowing how they're

feeling, because I was part of that, I was one

of them. And I always approach things with explanations

if necessary. I mean, there isn't an explanation

necessary for, hey, we're starting the official

Star Wars fan club, but there's an explanation

necessary when people want to produce their own

merchandise and sell it. and we have to tell

them, no, you can't do that. I'll tell you a

story from, this was the 1978 World Science Fiction

Convention. We were there, I was there representing

Lucasfilm and Star Wars. We didn't have anything

new to show, not in the summer of 78, but we

set up in the exhibit hall, with a small rear

screen projection set up showing a lot of production

art and foreign movie posters and stuff. And

I had a prototype of Mattel's, I'm sorry, of

Kenner's radio control R2 -D2, which is about

10 inches high or something. and was just about

as functional as real R2 was at that time. He

could go forward and back, he could turn left

and right, and you could spin his head around.

That was all the real R2 could do. Anyway, I

was there in the exhibit hall showing that. Unbeknownst

to me, the FBI showed up at that WorldCon. The

WorldCon was in Phoenix that year, and the FBI

has a big office in Phoenix, or used to, I don't

know if it still does, because a lot of East

Coast mobsters would retire to Arizona, so they

wanted to keep an eye on them. has a copyright

squad that deals with copyright and trademark

violation and stuff like that. They're not, you

know, they're not going through magazines and

saying, oh, you've got your copyright wrong.

But they're like seizing counterfeit merchandise,

fake Prada bags and that sort of thing. And they

showed up for reasons I don't know at the convention.

They had identified themselves to the convention

committee and the convention committee brought

the head of the squad over to meet me because

I was there from Lucasfilm. One of the things

they were going to do was go through the exhibit

hall looking at dealers selling bootleg merchandise.

Not something we had requested and not the sort

of thing we did Yeah, no, but so we talked and

I said look. Yeah, there are definitely people

here who are in the bootleg merchandise business

and there are some people here who are just fans

doing one little thing and We wanted you know

treat them accordingly. I can't you know, obviously

I can't give orders to the FBI Obviously, but

I told them how we would like them to proceed

For example, there was one young woman who had

a dealer's table, and among the things she was

selling is she had done some Star Wars artwork

and printed it up on notepads. And they told

her, take these off your table, don't sell them

while we're here, and just sell out of them.

Just don't keep printing more. Other people who

were like, clearly in the we're making here are

three dozen different Buttons and eight by ten

photos and you know, yada yada yada Spread out

on three dealers room tables, you know, they

were in the business of bootlegging Yes from

them. They actually seized all their merchandise

and gave them some kind of written notice about

violations and yada You know and all that kind

of stuff the the young woman I spoke to Afterward

she came up to me because you know, I was obviously

there from Lucasfilm being in the Lucasfilm booth

and And I said to her and she oh she said to

me, you know, it's i'm not i'm not I don't have

any money. You can't sue me and get money. I

said We don't want to do anything But we're not

looking for money from you We don't care about

that. The point is that the law is written so

that if we don't stop every instance of trademark

violation that we become aware of, we can lose

the trademark. If you don't enforce your trademark,

you lose it. You no longer have to the big company

that, you know, Wants to produce say a line of

action figures. You can't do that We have the

trademark and Kenner these days Mattel Hasbro,

I'm sorry. Yes God shoot me in the head The only

license to produce those you have to enforce

it so what so that's why they're telling you

Don't sell anymore. It's not that we're afraid

you're making money It's that you can cause us

to lose the trademark. Yeah. And so we have to

do that. You also, you know, you you don't have

to go out of your way to find every violation.

That's true. And so that was that was the position

I took. We don't have to go out of our way to

find every violation. We didn't want to stop

on fans enthusiasm. Yeah, we just had to have

them be aware of what we needed in order to help

them celebrate Star Wars because we all love

Star Wars. Yeah, absolutely. In the books, you

share insights into Lucasfilm's early convention

experiences, convention appearances. How did

fan interactions in those days shape your approach

to fan relations and marketing? Boy. you know,

everything you do, you learn something new, you

hear from people, you hear what they want. I

mean, marketing is really answering needs. It's,

you know, people, if you want to sell something,

you hear what people want to buy, and that's

what you sell them. If people want to It'd be

enthusiastic about something you've done You

support them in that enthusiasm and that's what

I tried to do what we tried to do within the

scope and limitations of what we could do we

did things like in 1976 we did a small display

at the World Science Fiction Convention of Props

and photos and artwork and costumes from Star

Wars the 1979 World Science Fiction Convention

Happened to be in England in Brighton While we

were still shooting Empire and so we went over

and we set up not big compared to say display

at a museum But a much bigger display in the

hotel the World Science Fiction Convention was

happening in in Brighton that year. Costumes,

photos and the query artwork. Isn't that where

you had like an actual snow speeder in the lobby?

Right. We brought a full size snow speeder and

set that up. It was in the sort of this concourse

that led to the exhibit hall. So before you went

into the exhibit hall, which is the dealers and

the art show and all that, you had to walk by

this full -size snow speeder. And there was a

sign on it saying, come see the Empire Strikes

Back exhibit in whatever the name of the room

was upstairs. And that directed people up to

our big exhibit. Very cool. Because we wanted

to share it with everybody. Yes, it's mercenary

in that we want people to know and be excited

and go and buy tickets. But it's also because

we cared about fandom. One of the reasons we

ran the fan club in -house, the official Star

Wars fan club, is I went and met with people

who were in the business of running fan clubs

for mostly like rock groups and, you know, things

like that. Some movie star, TV stars, but you

know, celebrity and other types of fan clubs.

And I just didn't like the way they operated.

They were much more mercenary. When you joined,

you got... a real, really poor quality membership

kit. You would get a badly printed, like an offset

printed photo, not a real photo, that kind of

thing, that kind of quality level. And mostly

what they were doing was harvesting addresses

to send ads to buy merchandise. Not what we were

looking for at all. We wanted something that

would keep people's excitement up. The fan club

wasn't a direct money -making operation. We lost

money on the fan club Yes, it was to keep people

excited about Star Wars between movies, but it

was to keep people excited about Star Wars and

we operated as What would I want if I were joining

the Star Wars fan club? And we just took that

attitude towards everything. And the more you

associate with your fan base, the more you know

what they want and how to please them. One of

the stories that I like that you tell in the

book is how, like, if Mark got mail, it went

to Mark. And if Kerry got mail, it went to Kerry.

But if Darth Vader got mail, you know... There's

a great story, I think, in the second book about

how you were at a convention somewhat recently

and people found out that you were the guy signing

Darth Vader's autograph. Suddenly, everybody

wanted your autograph, the guy who signed Darth

Vader. Because I think of, oh, you get movie

stars autographs and baseball player autographs,

not behind the scenes people autographs. But

people ask me for autographs frequently. But

they were asking me to sign both my name and

Darth Vader. That's awesome. So I was as I said,

I was six when Star Wars came out. And generally,

I do these podcasts and a lot of stuff with people

who are younger than me, like Mike. Sorry, can't

help that. They always can't hold their eyes,

because I'm a big Star Wars fan. I've been since

I was a child. And I always talk about how everything

changed. Everything was different after Star

Wars, and they were always like, yeah, yeah,

old man, Star Wars changed everything. But I

think it did have an undeniable and lasting impact

on popular culture. So in your view, what were

the key factors that contributed to the franchise's

appeal, its staying power, and its ability to

connect with generations of fans. Well, Star

Wars is amazing. There's really been nothing

like it before. If you look at movies before

Star Wars, in the decade or so before Star Wars,

they were serious. slice of culture, you know,

day in the life, deep philosophical, meaningful

things. The negative reviews Star Wars got, and

it did get a bunch of them, was it was just fluff.

It wasn't serious. It didn't add to the human

condition, that kind of stuff. But what it showed

was that people, as much as people are concerned

with the human condition, They also want to excitement

and they want to have fun and Just the success

of Star Wars Suddenly meant maybe we should be

making other types of movies that are more freewheeling

more more 30s 40s Kind of movies more fun. Yeah,

and you know and it There there was fandom beforehand.

There was even fandom for individual things,

not so much a movie, but Star Trek had a huge

ongoing fandom long after. Well, it had gone

into what's it called? In the 70s, it was, what

do you call that when you redistribute the old

film, old things? I can't remember. Syndication,

syndication. It had gone into syndication in

the 70s and that's when it really blew up. Well,

there was a big Star Trek fandom throughout the

60s and into the 70s. And then the show in syndication

helped expand that. Yeah. And it grew. And so

Star Trek had that ongoing fandom. It became

much more universal with Star Wars having a big

fandom and that joint kind of experience because

Science fiction was really still kind of weird

in the 60s, you know people who like science

fiction were strange Star Wars Went from oh,

it's science fiction. I'm not interested to I'm

not interested in science fiction, but I like

Star Wars, you know, it's slowly expanded as

more and more things fell into that, oh yeah,

but I like this. It became science fiction was

cool. They still treated a lot of us as nerds.

It wasn't really that cool, but I think it was

acceptable. It eventually became the mainstream.

Right, exactly. The fans weren't cool, the thing

was cool. But you know, and so it just and it

had just this huge effect. I mean, the types

of the movies that were being made completely

changed as of because of as of Star Wars. People

were seeing what they wanted and Star Wars got

made. To a great extent, because George and Gary

Kurtz were working on the edit of American Graffiti.

the film they had made together before, Star

Wars. And they wanted to take a break and so

they were looking in a newspaper to go, they

were gonna go see a movie and get away from American

Graffiti and just relax for an evening. And that's

what we used to do in the old days is we'd look

in a newspaper to see what movies were playing.

That's right. And they couldn't see any movies

they wanted to see. They wanted something fun

and exciting. And everything was, you know, easy

writer or, you know, you know, deer hunter or

godfather. Well, even not as much, you know,

stuff that was more psychological and, you know,

that kind of thing. And they said, you know,

OK, when we finish American graffiti, we got

to make the kind of movie we want to go see.

And that was ended up being Star Wars. They just

didn't realize how many people wanted to go see

that kind of movie. So getting into some more

movie memories and the writing life, more movie

memories is the sequel to your previous book.

How did the process of revisiting your memories

differ this time around with the sequel compared

to Star Wars memories? Well, it was a couple

of different things. One is I'd already written

a book, it had come out and people liked it.

which is always very nice, you never know if

that's gonna happen or not. A lot of people encouraged

me to tell, to do another book and tell stories

about all the stuff I worked on after Star Wars.

I'm very good at marketing other things, I'm

not very good at marketing myself, so I feel

a little embarrassed when I say things like,

a lot of the reviews, that the book got, the

first book, Star Wars Memories, was that my writing

style is very accessible and it feels like we're

having a conversation rather than you're reading

a textbook. Yeah, I get that. It's a very friendly,

open sort of style, which is very nice to hear

and it gave me, okay, so I will keep doing that

with this other stuff. At first, it was going

to be mainly about the other movies I worked

on throughout the 80s after I left Lucasfilm.

But during COVID, which happened almost immediately

after we first released Star Wars Memories, one

of the things I did is I went through all my

old file cabinets. to see what I didn't need

to keep anymore because, you know, stuff goes

into a file cabinet and it never comes out again.

Right. And so I failed a bunch of stuff that

I didn't know I still had things like the more

movie memories. Now, the final book has about

one third of it is additional. star wars stories

because i found stuff i didn't remember still

having like all the stuff about the rap party

for empire strikes back with the invitation and

photos of how they set up the party on the daggabah

stage in the middle of the daggabah set photos

of the cake and we had which was in the shape

of the the crew patch from Empire, stuff like

that. So there was a lot of memories. It's not

that they were, oh, these were the Star Wars

memories that weren't good enough for the first

book. This is just stuff I hadn't quite remembered

or didn't have enough material on to actually

feel I could actually write about them. So about

a third of the book is More Star Wars. The next

third is about lots of the movies I worked on.

Superman 2, Altered States, Excalibur, John Carpenter's

The Thing, Last Starfighter, The Muppets Take

Manhattan, Dark Crystal. You know, lots and lots

of different movies for Jim Henson, Disney, Universal,

Warner Brothers, other companies. And then the

last third of the book is I left movie marketing

and became a writer primarily of animation. And

it talks about working in that industry in that

field or that part of the entertainment industry.

My experience is trying to write for Star Trek

and creating my own show called Pocket Dragon

Adventures. We did a hundred and 104 episodes

and played in over 100 countries around the world.

We working on, you know, GI Joe and Beast Wars

and all kinds of animated shows. It's just memories

and stories about all these different things

I've done in the nearing 50 years I've been working

in the entertainment industry. I've got some

ElfQuest super fans in my friend circle and so

I was telling them the story about that and they

were all kind of like, oh well one of them already

knew everything because he's like that but how

you almost did the ElfQuest show and didn't happen?

Yeah I mean there's a bunch of stories in there

about things that didn't happen because I could

tell you oh well I was hired to develop this

show and so I came up with a concept and then

we wrote a bunch of episodes and you know that's

sort of kind of interesting and I could tell

it in a sort of interesting way but there are

only so many times that that's an interesting

story. The story is about things you worked on

and you did and then for one reason or another

didn't happen or didn't happen the way you would

hope. Those are actually More interesting and

more informative story. So there's a mixture

of Successes and I don't like the word failures,

but not successes. Hey, you got paid. That's

all that matters And it's funny because like,

you know obviously the the first book was an

easy sell for me because like I'm a Star Wars

super fan and then I looked into the second book

and I was like, you know, like you said The Thing,

and Altered States, and Superman 2, and Dark

Crystal, and Baby, Secret of the Lost Legend,

a movie that I thought I was the only one that

remembered. I saw that in the theaters, because

I'm also a huge dinosaur nut. I was like, oh

my god, this guy worked on my childhood. All

these movies that were such a big thing for me.

How do you think that your Lucasfilm experience

helped you working with all these other films?

Well, of course it helped. I left Lucasfilm right

after we opened Empire Strikes Back for a couple

of reasons. One is that George had told me that

he was going to be closing the LA operation down

and moving us, or some of us, up to Marin. and

keeping Lucasfilm all up there. And he also told

me that he was gonna make one more Star Wars

movie and then stop making commercial movies.

Well, the first one of those happened, the second

one didn't quite go that way. But it still meant

moving from LA, where I had grown up, To the

Bay Area and if I wanted to stay in the movie

business Three years later, I'd have to move

back because George wasn't gonna make any more

movies and there wasn't a movie business up there

So I decided I what I wasn't gonna I wasn't gonna

move But I decided to leave the company because

coming off the effect of off of Star Wars and

Empire Strikes Back That's a pretty good pedigree

when you try to go and find another job. Oh,

yeah. Yeah And in my case, I wasn't looking for

another job. I decided to become an independent

consultant To studios and In the same way saying

well my My previous work was Star Wars and Empire

Strikes Back. Do you want me to help you market

your movie? I left very shortly after we opened

Empire. I set up an office and almost immediately

had a contract with Warner Brothers to help them

market Superman 2, Altered States, Excalibur.

Those were the main ones, also The Hand, Outland.

I was employed almost immediately at nearly double

what I was making at Lucasfilm. Consultants get

paid a lot better. And I went on for another

10 years representing studios. Like I said, Jim

Henson, Warner Brothers, Disney, lots of places.

And it was a good time. It was a good career.

But then the industry changed. Both the industry

changed and I changed, but the industry changed

as I wasn't working with filmmakers anymore,

who used to be running studios. I was working

with attorneys and MBAs who I was spending more

time in meetings than actually doing the work

that I was being hired to do. It became less

fun to do. Work jobs aren't necessarily fun,

but if you have the option of it being fun, take

the job that's fun. Absolutely. I also found

I wanted to do something more directly creative

and writing seemed to be a good way to go for

me based on my interests and skills. Animation

was the first door that opened and so I ended

up doing mostly animation for the next Going

on 40 years. Yeah Dave mentioned the episode

that he had rewatched. I rewatched the probe

from Beast Wars. I love that episode. Oh Yeah,

that was a that was fun. Yeah Beast Wars We were

I worked on the first season of it and I just

wrote the one episode with my then writing partner,

Marv Wolfman. Oh, is that all? Just Marv Wolfman,

just comics legend, that's all. Yeah, well, comics

legend. Marv is a very close friend, still is.

We see each other all the time. And for several

years, we worked together as writing partners.

We co -created and co -produced the Pocket Dragon

Adventure series I mentioned. and anyway they

hired us to write an episode of Beast Wars and

one of the problems with Beast Wars at least

that first season because computer generated

animation CGI was so new and so expensive and

so complicated they basically Built most of the

assets at the beginning of the season and that

was pretty much what you had to work with for

the whole season You know, so we had six good

guy characters six bad guy characters and Props

and you know, there were no other characters.

There were no, you know, no people no None of

that stuff So the hard part was coming up with

reasons for there to be a story. A lot of the

episodes ended up being, oh, look, there's one

of the other guys. Let's fight. And I wanted

to have and Marv wanted to have something more

meaningful. And so we came up with this idea

for the for that episode, The Probe, which was

briefly the rest of the good guys. had sent satellites,

probes, out through the galaxy looking for their

missing comrades. And if they, you know, sending

out a beacon saying, hey, where are you? Let

us know, we'll come get you. And for reasons

that made sense within the universe of... Beast

Wars, they couldn't send a signal directly from

the planet's surface. They had to build a big

tower to get it up high enough to get through

a layer of stuff that kept the signal from getting

out. And so now the bad guys didn't want hundreds

of good guys to come and capture them. So they

didn't want the probe contacted. And so now there

was at least a reason, a goal for our good guys

to achieve and something for the bad guys to

make an effort to stop. Yep. Yeah, it was a fun

episode. Very fun. It's funny because this is

going to be the next episode of the podcast in

episode 109. Dave and I already recorded it.

We are going to talk about the holiday. and Lego

Holiday Special, but you debunked a myth about

the Star Wars Holiday Special airing only once.

How do you think this misconception persisted

for so long? You know, I really don't know, because

up until a couple years ago, I thought it had

aired only once in the US or anywhere. I was

under the same misconception. But. A fan in Australia.

did the research and went through the newspaper

TV listings and found that for two or three years,

it kept running in the holiday season in Australia,

because you could see the listings. It was there.

Yeah. I think that's the answer, Mike. It was

Australia. I mean, first of all, like If you

weren't around in 1978, I've watched shows about

the holiday special where people talk about it

like it was a myth. Like I never knew it was

like his big foot. I didn't know it was true.

I mean now because it's on the internet, it's

on YouTube, everybody knows about it and it's

a thing. But there was a period of time where

it was a videotape that was passed around at

conventions and there were people that didn't

know it existed at all, let alone that it aired

three times in Australia. I mean it's Australia,

it's the other side of the world. The question

is, and I don't have an answer for it, did it

air in any other countries multiple times? The

network in the US was willing not to air it anymore

because it didn't get a good reaction, but it

isn't uncommon for international distribution

to include X number of airings. And so it very

well may have run in England or France or Germany

or wherever, you know, two or three more times

than we're aware of. I don't actually know how

many countries it ever aired in. But yeah, it

was interesting to find out that it really wasn't

a one time only in the US and never again anywhere.

You mentioned that you worked on Muppets Take

Manhattan. Yeah, and what was your favorite part

and if you had to pick one who was your favorite

Muppet? I Guess my favorite has to be Kermit,

you know I just kind of relate to Kermit being

in the middle of all trying to make order out

of all the chaos And but having a good time and

trying to stay even -tempered and Throughout

at all, you know my favorite part really was

getting to know Jim Henson and working with him.

I actually started working with him on Dark Crystal.

Gary Kurtz was the producer on Dark Crystal and

he asked me to come and work on the film. And

I got to know Jim working on that and Jim asked

me to stay because they were starting Muppets

Take Manhattan right away. And Jim was just an

amazing guy. He was everything you want Jim Henson

to have been. He was by far the nicest guy I

have ever worked with, immensely talented, very

open, very friendly, and he was just. Just terrific.

Yeah, every time I see because I do doom scrolling

on YouTube shorts and Instagram reels and things

like that now on social media when I don't want

to do anything or when I want to turn my brain

off and just not think about the real world.

So when I doom scroll through some of these social

media platforms and I run across clips of Jim

on the old like David Letterman or Johnny Carson

or something and it's so fun seeing. Him talk

about the whole thing, but then immediately if

Johnny or Dave or whoever says hey Can you bring

Rolf out or can you do this like literally the

clip of him on on Letterman with Rolf is like

Dave asks him and Then he says oh, yeah sure

but like the yeah sure part of it is like in

Rolf's voice as he's getting I'm like Oh my god,

this guy is so cool. So fun in 1983 The World

Science Fiction Convention that year was in Baltimore,

Maryland. There's a touring museum exhibit, The

Art of the Muppets. We set up in the lobby of

the Baltimore Convention Center, where the convention

was taking place, a partial version of that Art

of the Muppets exhibit. glass cases where, you

know, Kermit and Piggy. And because of what we

were doing, there were dark crystal characters

like Askexus and Agra, you know, stuff like that.

And so we had this big exhibit set up and Jim

came to the convention. And when I set up on

the conventions program, he did one big talk.

in the convention's main hall for, I don't know,

a couple thousand people where, you know, he

talked and he answered questions and he did some

stuff with the characters. But then a little

later that day, Jim came down to the lobby where

we had the Art of the Muppets exhibit and we

had scheduled an event that was kids only. It

was for anyone 12 and under, I think, but the

kids who were at the convention mostly with their

parents. The parents or anyone else could stand

around the perimeter of the lobby. But in the

lobby, there was what in front of the glass cases

was one chair that Jim sat on and the kids were

all sitting on the floor. And this was something

he wanted to do. He wanted to do a thing for

the kids who were there, and it was just him

talking and answering questions, and he brought

out Kermit, and he did Kermit for the kids. if

you've ever seen him doing these, even on TV,

suddenly you are talking to Kermit. You're not

talking to the guy holding a green glove on his

hand. You're talking to Kermit. And I mean, that

was going on and it was just this amazing event

that was something that he just wanted to do,

you know, just to let the kids get close to Kermit

and some of the other characters. And that was

just the kind of guy he was. So transitioning

from marketing to writing, Some might say that's

a bold move. What inspired the shift and what

challenges did you face? Well, I think I've already

answered part of that question, you know the

industry changed I wanted to do something I wanted

to get out of the marketing consultant business

and into something more creative and Writing

was an opportunity, you know, the challenges

you face is you have to prove yourself Doesn't

matter how many people you know It doesn't matter

if you're somebody's son, which I'm not. I didn't

have any family I could use to get in. The only

thing I had going for me is I'd been in the industry

for a while, so there were people who I knew

well enough to call up and ask for a meeting.

That's absolutely an advantage, but that only

gets so far. You still have to have material.

to prove yourself Because no one is going. Oh,

he's my friend We'll pay him all this money and

then have they'll have to write the script for

no money Because you're not able to do it. So

I was able my friend Joe Straczynski Better known

as Jay Michael Straczynski. He later created

Babylon 5 among other things But Joe was working

in animation and he'd just been hired to be the

story editor, the showrunner on the animated

version of Ghostbusters called Real Book. And

back then we had the original syndication market

where they would order animated shows, they'd

order 65 episodes. which would play five days

a week for 13 weeks, and then they'd cycle through

them again. But 65 was the right number for that

13 -week span. But when you're doing 65 episodes,

you have a short time schedule to get them done,

you need a lot of writers. So it was a lot easier

for new writers to get in than it is today when

orders are much shorter and there isn't a syndication

market like that. But back then there was and

so Joe had some writers he went to immediately

who he knew would be able to deliver, but he

was willing to take a meeting with me and I pitched

him some ideas along with my writing partner

at that time, somebody much less famous, named

Mark Nelson. But we pitched him some ideas and

he liked One of them, he gave us a chance. He

hired us to, we wrote the outline, the outline

got approved. We wrote the script and ended up

writing three episodes for the first season of

The Real Ghostbusters before moving on to another

series called The Bionic Six at a different studio

where it did 10 episodes of their 65 episode

order. And I've stayed writing ever since. I

write, I develop shows for companies. I do a

lot of, I'm a story editor, show runner on a

lot of animated shows. I work on a lot of shows

for companies overseas. I've done shows in China,

Italy, France, Israel. I developed a show for

Israel. I did shows. two series for the Middle

East for a streaming channel out of Dubai. So

a lot of international work and I'm theoretically

going to be starting a screenplay and adaptation

for a Japanese producer once the contracts get

worked out. Very cool. So you mentioned just

now that you worked for like Ghostbusters and

we've talked about GI Joe and Transformers. But

you've also worked on, like you mentioned, Bionic

6, which like I actually have some of those toys.

Oh, those are fair. How do you approach writing?

I remember your story about how you can't even

find them on video or you can't get them. Can't

find the collections of those. Like there are

a couple of series you worked on where you can.

They never preserve them. But how do you approach

writing? I'm sorry. How do you approach writing

for different audiences? Do you go in with a

different approach for something that's known,

like Ghostbusters or G .I. Joe, and something

that's less known, like Bionic Six was at the

time? Sure. It's a mixture, because assuming

you're coming onto a show as opposed to developing

it, on the real Ghostbusters, there were personalities,

there were rules. Every show has what's called

a show Bible that tells you who the main characters

are, who any recurring characters are, places,

you know, props. Like in the real Ghostbusters,

it's the ectomobile and proton packs and you

know that and the ghost traps that sort of thing

that doesn't mean you're necessarily Restricted

to those things You might be it depends on the

show Because you other shows have more freedom

and you could invent new things But you have

to stay the biggest thing is it's a TV series.

You have to stay true to the characters Whether

it's an existing thing, like Ghostbusters, where

people are familiar with it from the movies,

or it's original to the TV show, so you just

have to stay true to the show concept. Because

the characters have to be the same from episode

to episode. In Indiana Jones, he can't be afraid

of snakes in Raiders and not afraid of snakes

in Temple of Doom. The characteristics have to

stay the same. So you have to be cognizant of

what the rules are for it and what the rules

are that you can break. In real Ghostbusters,

one of the rules was nothing from outer space.

It's all ghosts and spirits and nothing with

aliens and nothing out in space. But then I was

given the challenge by Joe, who was the show

runner, to come up with something that involved

aliens in outer space within the show. And so

that was the third episode. we did called ain't

necessarily so, which deliberately violated that

rule, but still keeping it within the framework

of the rest of the rules of the series. So I

mean, you always have to be cognizant of what

the setup is. You're playing in someone else's

sandbox. You got to keep the sand inside and

you don't bring sand from another sandbox. You

need to be inventive. One of the reasons You

hire writers. When we did Pocket Dragon Adventures,

we did 104 episodes. Marv and I wrote two episodes

together. We each wrote about 25 episodes individually.

And the rest of the episodes, which was like

50 episodes, we hired other people to do both

for reasons of scheduling. You can only write

so much at a time, but also, you know, you only

have, you sort of burn out on ideas for characters,

and people who are fresh to the characters come

up with things you might not have thought of,

or you might have thought of them if you hadn't

already thought of 50 other stories. So that's

why you bring in other people for their ideas,

but they have to be ideas that stay within the

scope of the sandbox. Absolutely, absolutely.

All right, we got just two more questions until

the ad break. We are only three short years away

from Star Wars being 50 years old. You experienced

it at its inception. After all this time, what

does its legacy mean to you? It means I'm very

old and tired. Stop, Ed. Stop. I hear that. Good,

you know, it's what does its legacy mean to me?

Star Wars has to a great extent shaped my life

You know, I wouldn't be in the movie industry

or the entertainment industry without it or unlikely

that I would be I met my wife Going to a convention

to do an Empire Strikes Back presentation. She

was there attending the convention Uh, so that

certainly had an effect, you know, all of my

career in one way or another leads off of what

I did at Lucasfilm and Star Wars in how it shaped

me and how it informed me. in connections I made,

in friendships I made. Now some of that came

off of who I was already, the person I was, my

knowledge of marketing from studying social psychology,

my involvement with science fiction and comics

fandom. So each grew from the other, but certainly

I owe Star Wars a great debt in Star Wars fandom.

And I've always been grateful and I've always

been involved. I still have friends at Lucasfilm.

I mean, there's nobody at Lucasfilm now who was

at Lucasfilm when I was there, but there are

people at Lucasfilm I have met since. Right So

but I mean, you know, so I'm still in contact

and I still often get invited to things by them

they they occasionally ask me for things they

win the Empire Strikes Back 800 numbers when

I found the old tapes for that and posted them

on Facebook and they went viral to the point

of Empire of Entertainment Weekly doing a story

on them in like 2019, after however many years

that is. I guess that's 40 years. Lucasfilm Archives

contacted me and asked me for copies of the tapes

because they didn't have any. And I've been asked

by publishing if they could quote from my book,

in books they were doing. So that's that's, you

know, very pleasing and and, you know, it's nice

to be appreciated. Absolutely. Did you want to

ask him about what is it that you have? You got

it about the book or the pamphlet or what? What?

I'm not sure what you're going. I was going to

bring up the fact that when we were talking about

the holiday special. a movie had just come out

and I got a copy of it earlier this year and

I rewatched it and I was like, hey, that's the

guy we're talking to, A Disturbance in the Force.

Yes, A Disturbance in the Force. It's a really

good documentary about the making of the Star

Wars Holiday Special. And it's fair too, because

it puts it in a context that I think a lot of

people don't, because people just see it now

and they don't, again, I'm old enough to remember

what the 1970s were like and TV from the 1970s

and my mother was a fan They approached it very

fairly there I mean they had seen it they were

aware of what it was like But they didn't come

to it with the attitude of oh, what is this terrible

awful thing? Let's make fun of it They did a

serious straightforward documentary about how

it came to be what it was supposed to be what

it was like compared to other holiday specials

of the period and how it ended up being what

it ended up being. And it's very fair. And yeah,

they interviewed me for it and I'm in it. There

are a few clips of me in it. Yeah, there's more

than a few. I think what Mike was asking was

mentioning, reminding me is, so part of my Star

Wars journey going way, way back is when I was

six, We were on family vacation in Florida and

I was staying with my cousins and they were all

talking about this movie that they had gone to

see and it was amazing and they're gonna go see

it again and again and again and again. And I

mean, spoiler alert, it was Star Wars and they

didn't take me. But they had a book. They had

like a little book that the theater gave away,

right? And I looked it up on, the weird thing

is I looked it up on eBay and I've got a copy

now. I've got a copy of a book, but it's completely

different than what I remember. I remember it

being very small because I was six and it was

small and black and white and this thing is like

It's big it's big and it's it's flat and it's

color were there different little pamphlets that

were given to the theaters there were there were

a couple different things there were and I was

not I was not involved with this but there were

Some but I'd call screening brochures that you

could get at theaters mm -hmm, and they were

small maybe six inches by eight inches or something

like that. That's what I've got, yeah. And then

there was another thing that's shaped more like

a calendar, the size of a wall calendar, which

is something we, but 20th Century Fox, sent out

to theater owners, to exhibitors, to encourage

them to book Star Wars. It wasn't available to

the public. It was strictly an exhibitor item,

an exhibitor brochure. And it had lots of color

photos and things like that. And like I say,

it was shaped like a wall calendar. And we did

a similar but shaped differently exhibitor kit

for Empire Strikes Back that was in a black cardboard

box with a black Darth Vader on it. One was,

you know, the box was shiny and the Darth Vader

was matte, I think. And inside were two wide

format, inside was a black computer Darth Vader

medallion on it. And inside that were two wide

format color Macquarie paintings. Oh, wow. Not

originals, of course, but prints. Two of Ralph's

paintings from Empire. And that was the exhibitor

kit for Empire Strikes Back. But the one for

Star Wars was, like I say, like a wall calendar

format. My memory just must be wrong, man, because

I remember it being a little tiny book, and it

was black and white, and it looked weird, and

I was like... Can I go with you guys? And they're

like, the classic line is, I said, can I go with

you guys? And they said, no, you wouldn't like

it. Like, if you could see the wall behind me,

it is nothing but Star Wars. Yeah. Like, at one

point, you mentioned the poster that was included

with the album. You know, the soundtrack album

had, like, that poster. Oh, the John Bertie poster.

Yeah. I got that at a toy show just a couple

weeks ago. Like, got it back. I had one as a

kid, and it was torn up to pieces on my wall.

Yeah. That's a great poster. Yeah, I love it.

Like, yeah, Star Wars basically defined my life,

too. So, yeah, I would say it's funny. John Berkey

is a terrific artist, did a lot of science fiction.

And I walked into the Lucasfilm office one morning

and there were like a dozen small ruffs by John

Berkey. of Star Wars art, and I so wanted to

walk out with that. Well, anyway, enough of the

Star Wars nonsense. Talk to us about your THX

1138 cosplay. Well, I was a huge THX fan. I saw

it in the theater when it came out. You know

I was What was what year was that I Forget now,

but whatever year that was it must have been

74 I was going to the Western con the Western

area science fiction convention which that year

was up in San Francisco and I talked a few of

my friends into doing a THX group so two of us

did THX -like characters, you know, the bald,

we didn't shave our heads, we had really terrible

bald skull caps, and we've got costumes made

up. And then we had three guys as chrome robots,

which is basically black pants, a black, you

know, turtleneck. We got blank face masks and

we chromatized them and motorcycle helmets and

then we got these giant dowels and painted them

black and so we did a whole group and we came

on stage and we acted out a scene from THX and

we won a prize and I mean today it looks kind

of cheap and awful but It looked, trust me, it

looked much better in 1974. Yeah, absolutely.

That's awesome. But you know, when I say I love

THX, I really love THX. It's actually the only

time I went to a costume competition at a convention

was to do that costume. Very awesome, very awesome.

All right, folks, we're gonna have a couple more

questions with Craig, but right now we gotta

go to a quick ad break. You're gonna hear some

podcast ads from other shows here on GCRN, as

well as other podcasts that we promote, and we'll

be right back, right after this. So let's say

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.com. See you then. All right, folks, we are

back here on this GCR interviews episode for

Geocast Radio and Studio 2009. We've got two

more questions for Mr. Miller before we let him

go. What advice would you give to aspiring film

professionals or writers based on your experiences?

Boy, advice. Well, you know, everything obviously

different people have different amounts of experience,

but it always comes back to having good material,

good samples. I mean, if you're writing television,

you absolutely have to have samples of the types

of things you want to show. No one's going to

hire you just because you say you're a writer.

They're going to want to read stuff. And feature

writers, obviously, you get hired based on things

you've written. So it's always the work that

counts the most. But it's get out there, meet

people. I used to teach. I was a part -time teacher

at the Art Institute of California, teaching

screenwriting and animation writing. And I always

told people, meet people. everyone in the industry

you meet they've got their job because or they

got their first job because there was this guy

or there was this woman who they met who was

doing this and they told them to show up over

here so I you know go to festivals go to conventions

meet and talk to people meet to meet other film

expiring filmmakers because one of you is going

to get a job and can open some doors for meetings

for the rest of you. It doesn't have to be meet

people who've been doing it for 40 years. If

you're all just starting out, one of you is going

to get a better job and you're going to help

each other move forward. That's the way this

industry works. Your work has to prove itself

for your career to continue in advance. But to

get in the door, it's so often just the luck

of having met someone who can tell you there's

an opening over here. But that luck is by having

gone out to meet people. You're causing yourself

to be able to encounter the luck. It's having

the samples to show. So you were lucky to have

the samples to show. You build luck. It doesn't

just happen. Not if you really want a career.

You have to make it happen. You have to make

it happen by doing the work. And part of the

work is getting out there and meeting people.

And it's hard when you're not in a film or television

making center. You know, obviously, New York

and LA, it's a lot easier to get into the industry,

but there's stuff being done pretty much everywhere.

So you just have to find it and connect with

it or, you know, maybe start up a monthly gathering

at a bar for aspiring writers or aspiring filmmakers,

you know, be your own group meetings. Absolutely.

Well, I think Mike gave me this question because

he knows that I am very anti -social online.

I gave you the question because I didn't want

to be the only voice talking for the next 10

minutes. But where can the fans interact with

you online? The easiest way to find me is on

Facebook. I'm on Facebook as both Craig Miller

and Star Wars Memories. I know a lot of younger,

mostly older guys who are still on Facebook or

older people, but hey, I'm older. I'm still on

Facebook. I'm still on Twitter or X. I don't

post much, but I can be reached there, I think.

I have a Blue Sky account, which I'm also not

on very often, but should be able to reach me

through there. Facebook's the easiest way to

do it. Very cool. Very cool. All right, folks.

Oh, and they of course can get copies of my books,

Star Wars memories and more movie memories through

Amazon or it's actually also available online

through Barnes and Noble and apparently Walmart.

They can get they contact me directly. I can

also autograph copies. Very cool. Very cool.

Yes, folks go read the books Star Wars memories

more movie memories it is they are both amazing

reads and anyone who's a Star Wars or movie fan

definitely would want to be reading these any

upcoming projects before I run through the closing

that you are allowed to talk about or are you

kind of done doing current -day stuff I'm still

doing current day stuff when someone hires me.

I don't work for a studio. I'm a freelance writer.

Like I say, I'm waiting to see if we're really

going to start this Japanese project. It's based

on a Japanese steampunk novel, which is really

cool that they want me to adapt into an animated

screenplay. have to get the final details and

commencement money to show up and then I'll start

on that and I'm open to other projects if people

want to hire a writer to develop or script shows.

Other than that, the only places I know I'm going

to be appearing right now is I'll be at a small

science fiction convention called Los Con here

in LA in a couple of weeks. It's Thanksgiving

weekend, and next year I'll be at WonderCon in

Anaheim and the San Diego Comic Con. I haven't

booked out anything else for next year yet. Yes,

folks. By the time you're hearing this, it'll

be the middle of December, so you'll miss out

on the Thanksgiving convention. But you can catch

him next year at San Diego and. What did you

say? WonderCon? Yeah, good old WonderCon. Gotta

love WonderCon. And hey, I'm open to other conventions

if you wanna. have me as a guest. I can write

cool. All right, folks, coming up here in the

dark side of December. And yes, that's what I've

termed the entire 31 days of these podcasts that

I'm doing. Dave and I will be back. We will be

talking about Star Wars, the holiday special.

and the Lego Holiday Special, the new Lego version

that Disney put out. So that's the next episode.

After that, Dave and I will be doing the music

for Star Wars The Sequel Trilogy, episodes seven,

eight, and nine. And then, folks, we begin a

nine -day mystery extravaganza because we're

gonna go through every single episode, all nine

episodes of season one of Columbo. So that's

what's... Yay! So that's what's coming up here

on the podcast. Dave, any final thoughts before

I run the closing line? I just want to thank

Mr. Miller for taking time out of his day to

come and talk with us. I really like the books.

When we first announced we were going to do this,

I actually bought them because I don't like reading

on a computer screen. I really enjoy them. I

have a friend who's really looking forward to

the second book because he's a huge Muppet guy.

Well great, thank you so much. Speaking of that,

the books, just out of curiosity, any plans to

do audiobook versions of them? Well, I'd love

to do an audiobook. When I wrote the first book,

people convinced me Even though I don't think

I have a voice for radio, people convinced me

I should do the audiobook because the book is

written in my voice and it's me telling stories

and we started recording it and then my wife

developed a disease that had her in the hospital

for three months. She's crying now, but I really

wasn't able to record and by which time You know,

the book came out, COVID happened, and we just

never recorded the audiobook. And, you know,

maybe we should still, maybe there would be an

interest in it. We should still, yes. I guarantee

you there would be. Because that was the first,

when you first sent us the email. And I was like,

oh, cool. Immediately went to Audible. Crap.

They're not on Audible. So yes, I mean, it might

just be me, but I'm telling you, there would

be interest. And yes, when you are someone who

is writing your story and telling your story,

it's best if it comes from the author, whether

you have a good voice for radio or not. And you

do, actually. Well, I won't debate whether or

not I have a good voice. But yes, I would be

doing the recording and maybe we'll still do

it. I have a friend who runs the Hollywood Sound

Museum and has offered to provide the equipment

needed. So maybe we'll still do it. Very cool.

We would definitely be listening to those in

the future, folks, if they are done. All right.

As Dave said, I echo the same sentiments. I'd

like to thank Mr. Miller for taking the time

to join with us here in this latest GeekCast

Radio Presents interview. I've already told you

folks what's coming up next here inside Studio

2009. As far as GeekCast Radio, I don't know.

Steve and I will be doing something over there.

I have no clue. So for now, you'll hear us back

in the studio soon.