How can one man embody the Galaxy's great hero, and Gotham's ghastliest villain?
This is the Evolution of Mark Hamill
Luke Skywalker made Hamill a household name,
but his outer space adventures are only half of the story.
Throughout his career, the actor has owned some of pop culture’s
most iconic roles, but things started slowly during
Hamill was born in California in 1951, but he didn’t stay there for long
As the son of a U.S. Navy Captain, his family moved constantly.
He attended nine schools in ten years, and by the time
Hamill graduated high school, he was actually living in Japan.
Mark moved to LA at the age of 17, working various odd jobs
and living in an old gardener’s shed for $55 a month
as he tried to make it in Hollywood.
His first paying role was a guest spot on a 1970’s Bill Cosby series,
and from there, he landed bit parts on various shows,
including ‘The Partridge Family,’
a 9-month stint on ‘General Hospital,’
and a co-starring role in a short-lived sitcom called
‘Texas Wheelers.’
"This is the dumbest thing I've ever heard of,
getting all dressed up to bury a duck."
Hamill was slowly but surely finding success
in the world of television, but
his big screen debut made him a megastar overnight,
thanks to a little movie called
When Mark Hamill first heard about the casting call
for an upcoming sci-fi fantasy flick, he was
26 years old and crashing on his friend and fellow actor
Robert Englund’s couch. Englund, who would later
become an icon of his own as Freddy Krueger,
had auditioned for Han Solo. Sadly, he didn’t get the part, but
he suggested that Mark should try out for the role of an idealistic farmboy named Luke.
"but I was going to Tosche Station to pick up power converters"
‘Star Wars’ changed the way movies are made and marketed,
and its global success made Hamill a household name
overnight, but he almost didn’t live to see it.
Five months before the movie was released,
Hamill was involved in a serious car accident.
His nose and cheekbones were shattered,
requiring surgery to repair the damage, and
forever altering the face that millions of fans would look up to.
You can see the difference in the ‘Star Wars Holiday Special,’
and ‘Corvette Summer,’ the box office bomb
he starred in immediately after ‘A New Hope.’
When it came time for the Empire to Strike Back,
the movie actually incorporated his accident into the script,
with a fierce Wampa attack
to explain Luke’s changed appearance.
His earnest performance as the archetypical hero
continued to thrill fans in ‘Return of the Jedi,’
and after the original trilogy ended, you’d think
he would have became a leading man like his co-star
Harrison Ford. Well, that didn’t happen,
because Hamill became a victim of Hollywood
‘Star Wars’ transformed Hamill into a teen icon,
but fame was a double-edged sword.
For years after the original trilogy,
studios were reluctant to cast him as anything but a babyfaced hero.
Luke Skywalker hounded him for years, and,
frustrated by the lack of meatier roles, Hamill
turned his attention to Broadway, where he
appeared in stage productions of ‘The Elephant Man,’
and replaced Tim Curry as Mozart in ‘Amadeus.’
When the latter play was adapted to film in 1984,
Mark was eager to reprise the role onscreen, but
a Hollywood executive flatly refused, saying
"I don't want Luke Skywalker in this film."
The only roles available to him were on TV shows
like ‘The Flash,’ or in cult sci-fi films like
‘Midnight Ride’ and ‘The Guyver,
"I want you to like me."
"Then why are you doing this to me?"
"Laura, I'm not going to hurt you.
Just don't run away from me, ok...
Promise!"
a far cry from the global phenomenon of ‘Star Wars.’
Hamill eventually realized that people couldn’t see him
as Luke Skywalker if they couldn’t see him at all,
so he took his face out of the equation
and tried his hand at
Hamill had actually experimented with
voiceover work before ‘Star Wars,’ in Ralph Bakshi’s
1977 film ‘Wizards,’ but he wouldn’t land the role
that made him an icon until 1992, where he appeared in
another masterpiece that changed the course of pop culture:
'Batman: The Animated Series'
Ironically, Hamill wasn’t the first choice to play the Joker
Originally, Tim Curry was cast to play Gotham’s
Clown Prince of Crime, but after a bout of bronchitis,
Hamill stepped in to replace him, just like he did in
‘Amadeus’ nearly a decade earlier.
Hamill made the role his own, with his over-the-top, cackling performance
that perfectly blended merriment and menace.
"They used to kid me because I was the only one
who would stand up. And I just thought to
energize the character, to shake my fist
and I felt I've got to stand up."
For a lot of people, Hamill is the Joker,
and for nearly 25 years he continued to portray
the character throughout cartoons,
animated movies, and the ‘Arkham’ video games.
Since he began as Joker,
Hamill has become on of animation's most prolific voice actors,
but he especially relishes playing the bad guy.
He went on to voice supervillains across several different shows,
from the Hobgoblin in ‘Spider-Man,’ to
reprising his live-action role as the Trickster
in ‘Justice League: Unlimited.’
After his resurgence, Hamill re-embraced his status
as a geek icon, appearing in cameos on ‘The Simpsons,’
‘Third Rock,’ and a memorable turn as
“Cock Knocker” in Kevin Smith’s ‘Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back.’
"Why do they call you Cock Knocker?"
"Actually there's a funny story behind that.
[laughs] "You're gonna love this; True story."
[groans]
See, Hamill isn't just an actor, he's an honest-to-goodness nerd.
and if you need proof of his cred, just check out
his sole directorial effort: the 2004 mockumentary
a love letter to fandom that gave many of his fellow
voice actors a chance to shine in front of the camera.
Hamill’s career could have ended here, as a beloved
but mostly irrelevant pop culture relic, but in 2015,
Hamill faced his biggest challenge yet:
Stepping back into the role that both made
and cursed his career, giving the galaxy
After Disney purchased Lucasfilm in 2012,
they went full steam ahead on production of the
long-awaited 'Star Wars' sequel trilogy
But first, they had to convince Mark Hamill to pick up the lightsaber once again.
George Lucas himself approached the actor,
just before the deal was sealed, and initially,
Hamill was reluctant to return to the galaxy far, far away.
He eventually agreed after hearing that Harrison Ford
would also be involved, because he didn’t want
to be the only holdout. Hamill grew a beard
and lost 50 pounds to play the older, grizzled Luke,
even though he only appeared onscreen
at the very end of ‘The Force Awakens.’
‘The Last Jedi’ gave him a much meatier role,
but after living with Luke for 40 years, Hamill had
his own strong opinions on the character.
He initially disagreed with director Rian Johnson’s
decision to make Luke a broken, jaded man,
but whether you loved or hated ‘The Last Jedi,’
Hamill's powerful performance helped ease the loss of the beloved hero.
and even though Luke himself might have joined
his father and mentors in the force,
Mark Hamill's Hollywood legacy will never truly die.