The grotesque Jabba the Hutt is yet another iconic Star Wars villain that has captivated
fans ever since he was introduced in Return of The Jedi.
Often referred to as the "Bloated One," though never to his face, Jabba was one of the most
notorious Hutt crime lords in the galaxy, who governed a large criminal empire in the
Outer Rim Territories from his desert palace on Tatooine.
In this video, we will look at the character’s creation, his backstory, as well as other
interesting facts.
So, let’s begin…
1.
Jabba was originally hairy Jabba was originally supposed to be a creature
with hair, a concept that sounds a long way from the slimy slug-like monster he eventually
became.
In fact, Lucas originally imagined the creature as wearing a fez, which is a flat-topped,
conical red hat typically associated with the Ottoman Empire.
Jabba’s facial design was inspired by actor Sydney Greenstreet, who is best known for
the 1942 film Casablanca.
Luckily, the fez was eventually removed, but the artists kept Greenstreet’s overall look
in order to develop the final design of the character.
2.
JABBA was originally a hermaphrodite Jabba’s sex was unclear during Return of
the Jedi, or maybe we just couldn’t see his genitals underneath all that blubber.
Anyway with Disney’s new Star Wars canon, all Hutts have been assigned genders, and
Jabba’s character is very clearly defined as male.
In the old Star Wars canon, the Hutt species had both sexual organs and could actually
choose which sex they wanted to become…
yuk…
3.
WARDROBE MALFUNCTIONS During the filming of the scenes involving
Jabba the Hutt in Return of the Jedi, there were plenty of wardrobe malfunctions to go
around, which may or may not have been the fault of the animatronic puppet...
The first incident involved Oola, the green slave girl seen dancing around Jabba in the
movie.
When Jabba starts yanking on her chain to pull her closer, one of her breasts appears
to fall out.
This malfunction has become one of the most talked about in the Star Wars universe.
Fans were probably hoping for a similar wardrobe malfunction involving Carrie Fisher and her
gold bikini, but this second incident is less nip-slip and more S&M…
Fisher ended up accidently stabbing the Jabba puppet with one of her heels, which punctured
the character’s tail and subsequently stabbed the puppeteer, poor Mike Edmonds, who was
operating it.
I bet he liked it….
4.
Blue Harvest When filming the sail barge scene in Return
of the Jedi, the producers wanted to keep the fact that they were making a Star Wars
film secret, especially as the location in Yuma, Arizona was popular with tourists and
dune buggy enthusiasts, of which there were 35,000 in the area.
So to ensure secrecy, the producers claimed to be making a horror film called “Blue
Harvest,” and went as far as to make hats and t-shirts for the crew and even came up
with a tagline: “Horror beyond imagination.”
Still, for the few fans that knew the truth, a chain-link fence was setup and a 24-hour
security service patrolled the area to keep people out…
5.
JABBA WAS SUPPOSED TO APPEAR IN EPISODE 4 You’d think that Lucas came up with Jabba
the Hutt’s character during the pre-production of Return of the Jedi, but you’d be wrong….
He was actually supposed to appear in A New Hope, but the effect required to finalise
the scene was too complicated for its time.
Lucas was planning on compositing an animatronic Jabba over the stand-in actor, Declan Mulholland,
but the results were not pleasing…
Lucas finally realised his dream with the 1997 “Special Edition” of the film, where
a CGI Jabba was superimposed over Mulholland, ensuring that Jabba makes his grand entrance
in a new hope first… 6.
JABBA’S LANGUAGE
Like all Hutt characters in the Star Wars franchise, Jabba speaks Huttese.
Huttese is a fictional language inspired by the real Incan language, Quechua.
But the puppeteers working inside would speak the character’s dialogue in English while
filming the scenes.
For this reason, everything that Jabba The Hutt says in Huttese has the same amount of
syllables as its English translation – this way, the puppeteers wouldn’t have to memorize
the lines in Huttese while working the puppet at the same time, that would have been some
impressive multi-tasking.
Anyway, as is Star Wars custom, the original dialogue was dubbed with the Huttese version
during editing.
7.
About the puppet Jabba eventually became a CGI character with
the release of the 1997 special edition of A New Hope …and subsequently much easier
to work with as an actor.
But the amount of effort that went into creating the original animatronic puppet in Return
of The Jedi is quite mind-blowing.
For starters, the puppet took Stuart Freeborn’s team a total of three months to build.
Fans will remember that Freeborn created the design for Yoda…
The final weight of the puppet was around 200 pounds, and the total cost hovered around
$500,000.
There were three puppeteers inside (one controlled the right arm and the jaw, one controlled
the left hand and the jaw, tongue and head, and a third person was inside the tail …you
know, the one that got stabbed.
Outside of the puppet, two people worked as radio controllers for the eyes while someone
sat under the stage to blow cigar smoke up a tube.
Finally, there was another person outside of the puppet who would work the lungs.
8.
THE MANY SOUNDS OF JABBA The large, slimy, disgusting Jabba comes with
equally repulsive noises to match, and how some of these sounds came to be is actually
ingenious….
For instance, the noises made by Jabba’s wet and slimy movements were created by soundman
Ben Burtt.
You might remember him as designing Vader’s breathing.
Anyway, he ran his hands through a cheese casserole to get the slimy, slithery sound.
His voice and Huttese-language dialogue were performed by voice actor Larry Ward, whose
work is not listed in the end credits.
A heavy, booming quality was given to Ward's voice by pitching it an octave lower than
normal and processing it through a subharmonic generator.
9.
Jabba has a son Shortly after the outbreak of the Clone wars,
Jabba's infant son, Rotta, was kidnapped.
Though Jabba did not know who the kidnapper was, it was carried out by his uncle, Ziro.
Jabba requested the assistance of anyone who could help, and the Republic and the Jedi
Order answered the call.
It was the hope of Supreme Chancellor Palpatine that the Republic would be able to negotiate
an alliance with Jabba the Hutt for use of Hutt hyperspace lanes in the Outer Rim, as
the Separatists controlled all the major lanes… anyway you’ll be glad Jabba is eventually
re-united with his slimy little son…
10.
He will feature in the Han Solo spin-off movie Entertainment Weekly recently interviewed
Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy.
Apparently she hinted at the movie featuring a lot of familiar faces including Solo's wingman
Chewbacca, Lando Calrissian, Jabba the Hutt, and even Greedo.
As Solo mentions himself, he’s smuggled goods for Jabba multiple times, so it could
be interesting to see at least one of these missions on the big screen.
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I’ll see you later.
Hit the like button you must, yes, mmm…