346 – Interview Previews – Craig Miller Director Of Star Wars Fan Relations!

Impressive. Most impressive. Hello, ladies and

gentlemen. It is I, TFG1 Mike, from the Geekcast

Radio Network. And in this special episode of

Geekcast Radio, this is a... interview preview

we normally don't do stuff like this but i need

something here to fill this episode because the

next episode of the podcast after this is going

to be the final gcr of the year for 2024 where

steve megatron and i talk about the gcrn and

what we did in 2024 but this this episode right

now that you're listening to the sound of my

voice this is an interview preview we've never

done this before So, my buddy Dave Draper, who

does the 12 Months of Star Wars and other things

with me over on our other podcast, Studio 2009,

we got a chance to interview Craig Miller, Director

of Fan Relations for Star Wars. This is a very

short little snippet preview of that interview.

And the only reason why it's a snippet preview

interview is because the full interview is coming

December 8th. 2024 in the 31 Days 31 Podcasts

with Studio 2009. Yes, folks, that's right. From

episode 100 to 131, we're giving you 31 Days

31 Podcasts all throughout the month of December.

But please enjoy this little snippet. of our

interview with craig miller this is craig miller

director of star wars fan relations and you are

inside the 12 months of star wars only on studio

2009 Hello and 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

-month 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. 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 going to kick it off. Yeah.

Well, first of all, because a lot of our readers

might not have read those books yet. We're going

to 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. Yeah, well,

I was, 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 Science fiction, you know, 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, you know, very, at the very beginnings of

their careers, they hadn't been stars of anything.

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 in magazines

and you got your stars booked on talk shows like

The Tonight Show. And no one was going to book

Mark Carrier 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, 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. you know person

a filmmaker fit whatever you want to call it

uh you know i 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, 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

completely finished. But, you know, but it was

as close to finished as, you know, there was

nothing noticeably unfinished. And so it added

excitement to the event. But, you know, 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 star destroyer. coming

on screen and coming on screen and coming on

screen. By the end of that scene, the movie had

me. You know, it was just amazing. Yeah. You

mentioned in that chapter, my first viewing,

you talked about how emotional your reaction

was to seeing the completed film for the first

time. Was was there any other moments at Lucasfilm

that had kind of a similar impact? Oh, gosh.

You know, it. Yes and no. I mean, going to London

and going on stage into the Ice Cave and seeing

the full -sized Millennium Falcon. Oh, yeah.

And, you know, and the X -Wings and everything.

That was from the, you know, 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'd 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 that

stuff surrounding you you know that was just

amazing the first time i got to operate r2d2

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

City. 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 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 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. You know, there's 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 i what story i could tell you that

isn't part of that yeah yeah um i mean there

you know obviously we all have things we do in

our life i went to the supermarket and i bought

eggs yeah yeah i i you know i tell stories that

are entertained 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 um so You

know, 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 work with, like 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, you know, 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. 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 aside to what my next question is going

to be, but when I was reading both of them, I'm

like, this is why I love reading. Because I'm

reading somebody's story that I've never, that

I had never 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 you are, obviously,

sir, and stuff like that. That is so cool. Listen

up. We'll get to the offices. But all your office

moves and stuff like that, I was like, oh, that

is so cool. You get to do various things at each

different location and everything else. 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 bit 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 was

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

in a way. 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. You know,

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 didn't

know what, you know, 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.

You know, that was never. part of my imagining

so it was you know amazing it was dealing with

people who i never thought i'd deal with doing

things you know flying to different countries

and being on movie sets and locations and going

to premieres and all that kind of stuff you know

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? Okay, well, I never did the market

research, but Fox had a market research department,

and I'm sure... studios still do and they 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. You know, it's

the way they tested movies, not the part where

they show it to them and, you know, 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 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? Those are valid questions to ask.

But they are limited in scope. Plus, what they

did is they went out to Hollywood Boulevard,

which in L .A., even back in the 70s, was a sort

of mid -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 really bad. 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, you

know, 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 it was, you

know, 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. Join us next time here on

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