Episode IV: Dreams Have Limits

Making of an empire This is Blockbuster. Episode four.

Summer nineteen seventy six. London. Fox continues to increase the budget of the Star Wars, now past the$10 million mark. It's not enough. George's stress level continued to rise, and talking to Marsha back in LA seemed to help, but now George was breaking bad news, trying to explain why he'd put much of their personal savings into this struggling film. 400 grand? George, that's our money. We need it for the special effects. What if we never get that back?

Marsha had a point. Movies flop all the time, but George didn't have time to think it over. He was all in. Fox won't pay for it. Like his friend Steven Spielberg on Jaws, George was still rewriting parts of the script as they were shooting scenes. Skywalker. Luke's Star Killer is now Luke Skywalker, and George has been wrestling with a major plot twist, killing off a major character. Come in. Alec, thank you for making time. Of course.

Sir Alec Guinness was the only established actor in the cast. He's had opinions on Obi Wan's story arc and is frustrated at what he sees as George's indecisiveness. So what do you think? Kill off Obi-Wan and the Death Star. Alec couldn't believe his ears. The decision should have been made months ago, so the actors could prepare and give the right performances. Isn't it a bit late for such decisions?

It was actually Marsha who suggested Obi Wan's death. It would make the revenge of blowing up the Death Star even more satisfying in the end. George saw Alec's temperature rising. Actually I don't have to do this at all. Alec, I I know it's frustrating. George, frustrating? Let me explain let me explain. So in the in the last half of the movie, Obi-Wan doesn't really have anything to do while Luke saves the galaxy.

Maybe it was George's patience to explain the new story arc. Maybe it was the$15,000 a week, or maybe the 2% of the entire film's profits Alec had been promised. Who knew if it would amount to much any more, but something about George gave him reassurance, even as things on set were about to get much worse. I should have expected to find you holding Vader's lead. Rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'. Can we do it again faster? More intense?

George was an idea person, not an especially warm and friendly one to strangers. And this union crew didn't seem to trust him. George always expected them to work until he got the perfect shot, but he was constantly interrupted by hard union mandated breaks, at least four of them every day. Ten a tea time. 115 is lunch, everyone. 4 p.m. tea time. Fuck that, eh? Each break required a reset, and George wasn't getting the shots he needed. George, I don't know about this line.

That was Harrison Ford. He often found his dialogue clunky, unnatural. He'd improvise where he could, but sometimes his lines were a mouthful that seemed to slow the scene down. You can type this shit, but you can't say it. Okay, we'll rewrite. That's a day, everyone. Pressure was building. Fox had lost faith in George, who kept asking for more money and time for his new scenes. The studio suggested bringing in another director to take over. But George's producer, Gary Kurtz, held them off.

The hours you're putting in, I think you're getting paid about a buck ten an hour. Tell me about it. I I'm stretched too thin. The movie's too big. A big film meant fewer things George could do himself, and with hundreds of crew members everyone needed his input. He knew he'd never finish with a union crew that quit at five thirty each day, sometimes hours away from the shots he needed. Gary, I'm gonna ask the union for a vote.

The vote would ask the union to wave their brakes. Are you sure you'll win? Look terrible if it doesn't work. George knew the vote would be tight, but he just needed a majority. Some of the crew clearly thought the film was ridiculous, but by forcing a vote, if he won. The crew would have to unite behind him, just like Alec Guinness did. He could make up lost time and save his movie. That was Gary calling with the results of the vote. Hello? Yeah.

The crew had united, all right, united against this goofy American kids movie whose director was always asking for more. Now, no one believed in him. George had lost the goodwill and trust of his entire crew.

Mobile Alabama. An incredible summer storm, the kind you only get in the American South. Cracks of lightning split the sky. Inside the Air Force hangar, the crew is trying to shoot despite the incredible noise around them. The ground rumbles with each crack, louder and louder. It made it difficult for Steven's crew to hear anything. Okay everyone, we're not getting anything done today. We'll pick it up tomorrow. Then a boom.

A flash of light. The south side of the hangar ripped open. The hangar wall, a hundred feet tall, began to buckle, and the rain began to pound Steven's elaborate set and props through the opening. Everybody take cover! Get the cameras out of the way! The hanger's gonna b- Come on! Everybody take care! Get out! Get out of here! Oh my god!

Luckily no one was hurt, but the storm had blown open one end of the hangar, which they'd been using to shoot night scenes during the day, and the rain had damaged parts of the set. It would be expensive. They'd have to put shooting on hold until crews could repair the damage. Hello? George, it's Alan. Summer 1976, London. Alan Ladd Jr. was the only executive left at Fox that still believed in George. I know, I know.

The stress had finally done George in. His health had turned. He developed a fever, a hacking cough, and it hurt to speak. Nearly four months into production, it was clear the film wouldn't make its Christmas release date. It would have to move six months later to summer of next year. The board at Fox felt the production was starting to jeopardize their bottom line, and even Allen knew their time was up. George, you know I wouldn't have to go.

have one week to finish or they're gonna shut you down. They'll pay for a second and third unit, but I can't go into the next board meeting and tell them we're still shooting. They're gonna pull the play. George had no choice. His friend Steven Spielberg had offered to fly in to run the second unit, with the close encounter set still under repair. But George was embarrassed, ashamed. He couldn't let Stephen know how bad things were. how badly he'd screwed things up.

What would Stephen think of him? George and Gary would find their second unit elsewhere. For the final week of production, George sprinted from stage to stage between multiple crews filming at the same time. This shot needs to be a close up. Close up the sh the short list says a Y. He tried to prioritize his most important shots before his time ran out. He also decided on a title change.

The Star Wars sounded so pretentious, and his movie clearly wasn't going to be what he had planned. Now it was just Star Wars. With shooting done, he'd turn his attention to editing on a film that had long overstayed its wealth.

For weeks George had been unhappy with the early edits of his movie. The studio had recommended a British editor, John Jimpson, who dissembled footage shot each day on set. George cringed as he watched the edits. Nothing felt right. It was boring. Wideshot after wide shot. It was like looking at a series of still images. Spliced throughout were notes for the effects being created back in LA. Explosion goes here. Spaceship here. Lasers fire here. This was not the same movie George had envisioned.

The characters had no chemistry together. Star Wars had no heart. This is Marsha. Hey babe. Listen I have a question for you. We we need a new edit from from scratch. It would be Marcia Lucas who had just finished editing a film with Martin Scorsese, who would come in to re-edit Star Wars. As it turned out, she would be the film's secret weapon over the next few months, sorting through more than 340,000 feet of film to find the passion in each character and storyline.

July eighteenth, nineteen seventy six. Mobile, Alabama. On his way back from London, George made plans to visit Stephen on the set of close encounters. They were meeting at a motel that had become Stephen's unofficial office. There he is. Buddy. The two were happy to see each other, but both surprised at how the other had aged in just a few months' time. What's that you got? Stephen had been asking to see footage of George's ambitious movie for months.

Oh here. Before George left London, he'd made a booklet of glossy photos to share, just filmmaker to filmmaker. George, this is some of the greatest stuff I've ever seen. Look at that detail on the Millennium Falcon. That's incredible. Stephen saw George's anxiety. He understood completely. Wow. Unbelievable. The two flipped through the pages together as if kids again, turning the pages of a comic book. It took us four weeks to build that background. You can't even see it.

Ah on solo look at Harrison. With each image Stephen lavished praise, George mentioned the bad lighting, or how the camera operator had missed the shot. Yeah. It's not really what I thought it'd be. George was clearly depressed, but Stephen wasn't sure why. George This looks incredible. It'll be a miracle if Close Encounters looks half this good.

Their two movies were now slated for release within a month of each other, both summer of 1977, both expensive, big-budget sci-fi adventures. Fox and Columbia saw them as rivals. Stephen shared some of his own work with George from inside the Air Force hangar. We're shooting night scenes in there during the day, but since the sign blew off we can only shoot at night. Most of the crew is nocturnal. That's genius. Oh, check this out. I got a letter from NASA.

They think the film is likely to cause a panic. I guess with people saying UFOs. They wrote all that? Twenty pages of it. It's pretty boring actually. I was hoping they'd tell me I had the aliens all wrong. Your your movie is gonna make so much money. And and John did the thing? We should. Got to it. He mailed us a tape so we could play it on set. He's amazing, George. Just wait till you hear what he comes up with for Star Wars.

Both George and Stephen had more faith in each other than in themselves. I'll tell you what, George. I'll trade points with you. Two and a half percent. So I'll give you, um, two and a half percent of Star Wars for two and a half percent of close encounters? I'll gamble with that. Okay, let's do it. They seal it with a handshake, a handshake that neither of them had any idea would be worth over forty million dollars. Well we'll see what happens then.

Fall nineteen seventy six, Hollywood. John Williams has been writing themes for Star Wars for some time, enjoying the rich tapestry of characters and worlds all blending into one story. That's it. George, so good to see you. With George is Lionel Newman, the head of music for Fox. Altyazı M.K. George. Marvelous adventure you've created. George looked depressed. He hadn't seen John since Star Wars was still just a concept. Now he could see all its flaws. I heard you visited Stephen in Mobile.

I did. You should see the production he's running. He's had me working on a few things you can see over there in that stack. It's interesting. All based on five notes. Oh. But if I may direct your attention to the big table over here, this is your music for Star Wars. Against the wall was a long wooden table, and a neat spread of loose paper, sheet music, sketchbooks, and brightly colored dividers spots. Yeah. It was organized so they could quickly jump in to any scene in the film.

I think you might like Luke Starkiller's theme in particular. Excuse me. Skywalk. Right? I like that a lot better too. Where shall we begin? Well, let's start at the beginning. Very good. Lionel dear, would you flip the switch for me? Of course. John and George walk over to the piano. So right as the first frame comes in What's wrong? John, it's it's beautiful. Oh. You had me concerned. No no it's it's the most beautiful thing I've ever heard. It really is. And maybe it concludes with

Could barely believe it. For two hours they made their way through the film, John playing his music at the piano. Even the placeholders for special effects shots. With John's music. Johnny, this is all incredible. Really? So glad to hear that, George. George had been approved to do some reshoots. One of those was the Cantina scene. It was the scene where Luke first meets Han Solo. Hmm. Sort of the beginning of their adventure together.

No, not not a score. Well, so there's a band playing in the cantina. I was thinking we should be hearing some kind of uh bizarre Probably. Western country primitive rock music? Something may be jazzy. It's a cantina band, maybe a Benny Goodman quality to it? Yes, yes, I like that. But but but like like a a people a thousand years in the future found it. Uh under a rock. You know, and they're they're trying to interpret it and it sounds a little strange.

That description itself was strange. Lionel smiled knowingly, eager to hear what John would improvise. A bit off balance. Yeah. John turned back to the piano and began to rock his shoulders side to side as if dancing to terrible upbeat jazz. That's it? It's perfect. John, you're a master. George had lost track of time. He was due at the special effects warehouse and Van Nuys to review the shots created while he was away filming.

John, fantastic work. Uh I'm looking forward to the recording session in London. London Symphony Orchestra, in fact, they can't wait to record.

Van Nuys, California. It's the warehouse of industrial light and magic. The company George had started to create cutting-edge special effects for his movie. Hey, Mr. Lucas. Hey, is uh John Dykstra in here? John Dykstra ran the day-to-day. All around him, George could see bits and pieces of miniature sets, lights, camera rigs, the Death Star, and part of his Millennium Falcon. John was getting George up to speed on their progress. Well uh we're behind.

We are building our own electronics here, not just the miniatures. The camera moves have to be smooth and the lighting has to match. How far behind? I I thought you were doing that months ago. We were, but you know, it's a lot, George. We have Here we have three hundred sixty shots in the script, and we're gonna need more time or more help to get it done. How far along are we? Not uh Halfway? A third of the way? It's You know, it's complicated. We have 360 shots. How many are done?

And and they look great. They do. Oh my god. Amen. George felt something. Was it rage? He tried to fight it back. The news nearly knocked the wind out of him. He took deep breaths. In months, ILM had completed just three of the 360 shots they needed. They weren't even 1%. of the way there. It was a nightmare, worse than a nightmare. For the first time, the panic fully set in. Without these shots, his movie could never be finished.

tried to regain his composure in his car when he felt a jump in his chest. Then again, his heart was pounding. He was sure this was a heart attack. He only had a few minutes to get to the hospital. Amen. He tried to slow his heart rate by breathing slowly, but it wasn't working. The hospital wasn't far and he knew he had to try. And into the emergency room roundabout. leaving his car door open and rushing in through the sliding double doors. I think I'm having a heart attack. Yeah. I need help.

Sir, sir, are you alright? Sir are you heading channel? Amen. Alright, sir, can you hear me? I do like it now, but... Amen. Dr. Fisher, Dr. Fisher to Orthodox. Doctors had rushed George to a bed. Marcia had now joined him at the hospital. Mr. Lucas. Yes. Well the good news is you didn't have a heart attack. I reviewed your vitals and medical history, and I think this may have been anxiety related. Have you been under a lot of stress? That's one way to put it. Mm-hmm.

What I think this is, is extreme stress exacerbating hypertension, sometimes referred to as exhaustion. It does require immediate attention, so it's good that you came in. So, what does that mean? It means you're at risk of it happening again, so I highly recommend that you make efforts to reduce that immediately. It can potentially trigger a heart attack.

George stared straight ahead as he listened. Marcia held his hand. Reduce his stress level? If he left for even a day, the whole thing would fall apart. I'm I'm I'm I'm directing a movie for Fox. I um I don't know if I can possibly reduce my stress level. Well Mr. Lucas, I recommend you find a way. Depression sunk in as the doctor walked away.

Just hours after arguing over special effects, George sat in a hospital gown, contemplating his life. A sobering reminder that even dreams have their limits. George would have to choose between Star Wars and his life. He and Marcia looked at each other. They both knew the decision was already made. On the next episode of Blockbuster. Alright, wait. How did they know where the air? Not bad, huh? Georgia's closest allies lose hope.

I don't mean to sound harsh, but And a maestro conjures up the musical spirit that will save the world. Yeah. If we're ready, shall we begin? That's coming up on episode five of Blockbuster. This season of Blockbuster took months to research, write, cast, record, sound design, and compose the original score.

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This is Peter Bawviet, lead sound designer and editor of Blockbuster. Stay tuned for a short conversation about how we made this episode. But first, would you please take a quick moment to give us a five-star review and share us with a friend? And for extras and exclusives, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Or support us at getblockbuster.com. I'm Peter Bawviet, the sound designer and editor of Blockbuster.

And I'm Matt Schrader, creator and narrator of the series, and uh welcome to this behind the scenes conversation. Peter, we're here again about this episode you just heard, maybe our our most intense episode yet. And each week we're discussing a little piece of the creative process. And um I'm here in

the studio of Peter Baviec where all of this sound design and mixing, or a lot of it at least, happened. That emergency room scene at the end of the episode we just heard, I remember We were sitting right here in your studio at one point back uh back in the fall and going through the episodes early on, might have been the table reads, and your eyes lit up and you said, let's do all sound design, let's do a montage here.

Well we knew that Ryan and Ben are going to provide us with an incredible score from the beginning. We've worked with Ryan before on actually score the film music documentary. So where I was the mixer and you know, we we knew that they're gonna provide us some terrific material. So I just kind of felt immediately from the start that that scene and there were certain scenes that it would be great not to have any music on them.

But instead establish that there is actually some kind of sound language to the entire series. And very early on, when I think when we were actually doing the table read. I was in the studio while everyone was reading and I was just taking notes to myself, like this is a a nice moment for music and this is a nice moment for sound design. Yeah. To actually and that's what we've we've achieved because we we tried to a have what at least one segment one section where it was just driven by sound.

Right. Can you talk about how you were able to collect all of these sounds? Because we have Something like that. It's bas it's surprising because we thought going into it, we knew it's gonna be big But as a podcast, like I didn't expect us to go to s to a track count equal to like a I don't know, Indy feature, you know,'cause that's what indie features will have. They'll have like two hundred tracks or so.

of audio on a final mix. And here we are doing a podcast that has so many tracks and we're like, well we kind of need them. It's not an overkill. It's like we really need because we've got a lot of categories. We've got all the dialogue, all the loop groups, all the all the archival stuff. We've got all the design elements, all the foley, all the backgrounds. So it was like a lot of material. Um that just together makes one one big How much

Much of that was were materials you were sounds you were able to find somewhere versus sounds that were recorded. Because obviously all the dialogue is things that we did. A lot of the sounds also though are sounds that You or I or someone else recorded at some point. Yeah, I mean as a sound person I I ju wherever I go I always go with my microphones. They're kind of my babies. Right. And and it's like

The microphone is always with me. So it's like I'd I have my own library which I've been creating over the years of working in the film industry of Everything, all the way from insects in Malibu to winds in the Grand Canyon. And you actually can hear some of that stuff in the podcast.

A lot of it is just from sound effects libraries and and a lot of it was recorded for this podcast where we were like, Okay, this is what we're going to do. Um I c actually I think actually one of my favorite sounds that I recorded that's in the series Uh huh. You know what? Well I don't want to spoil that. 'Cause I'm gonna probably say no it's shitty. No, I'm actually curious. We're gonna cut this out, but what what do you think it was? Was it the moon? The stargazing sound. Oh the

Vortex the vortex. The reverse vortex. The one of my favorite sounds actually that I recorded accidentally once, uh, although not accidentally, because I knew they happened and as a kid I've heard them, is um if you go uh at an airport about a mile under maybe less than a mile, half a mile under the flight path, the landing path of an airplane, about a minute after the plane passes over your head and it does a

you hear the air vortex, the the wave of air crashing back at each other which was before pushed away by the airplane. It just creates this really interesting like Sound which it would not expect after a seven four seven because it's so tender and Yeah. Steven seeing the the meteor shower.

Record this uh Last year I spent an entire day eating in an out burger in the car at Ontario Yeah, on Ontario Airport, just microphone on the roof and I was just sitting there, DHL and FedEx airplanes landing all day long. Peter Baviad, sound designer and editor of Blockbuster, thanks for this chat. It's absolutely a pleasure. Thank you so much.

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