A fun chat with actor ‘Warwick Davis’ about Solo: A Star Wars Story
I have been blessed to interview a number of great actors this past year. Each one has been a lot of fun where I have gotten to learn some amazing things about them. When I heard I had the chance to talk to Warwick Davis I was very excited. He has been in many of my favorite films, and tons of Star Wars movies. I was able to interview him and here is some of the things we talked about.
(c) Walt Disney Pictures
So how did you originally get into acting?
Warwick Davis: Well, it was 1991. My grandmother heard a radio announcement from a London radio station. I guess it went out for Lucasfilm. They were looking for short people to be in the new Star Wars film Return of the Jedi. They didn’t say it at the time, but they needed people to play Ewoks. She heard of this announcement and thought of me. Maybe she thought of me because I used to talked about Star Wars all the time. When she heard the word Star Wars she thought of me. I was obviously short as well.
She told my mom and dad about it, and my mom phoned the studios. They said ‘Well, we’ve got everyone we need. We have made the calls, and we have filled up the number of people we need.’ I don’t know what my mom said to them, but she managed to persuade them to see me. I remember being real excited to be going up to the studio.
I met with a production assistant who said ‘Do you want to try for an Ewok?’ I said ‘What’s one of those?’ And she said ‘Well you will put on that when you go get measured up in the costume department.’ And that was it, that was how I got inside. That was my big break as it were. I didn’t have to audition, no performance. It was literally my Nan hearing that announcement and me being I guess the right height for the job.
(c) 20th Century Fox
So what were some of your best memories working on Return of the Jedi?
Warwick Davis: I mean, meeting my at the time on screen heroes. In the shape of Carrie Fisher, Mark Hamill and Harrison Ford. Meeting those three and getting to spend time with them and hang out with them was kind of every Star Wars fans dream. It was interesting, I didn’t really see them as the actors. I saw them as the characters all the time.
So between takes I would chat with them, but I was almost chatting to them as if they were the characters. I was always asking stuff about Han Solo or Princess Leia or Luke Skywalker as opposed to saying ‘Mark, what did you have for breakfast this morning?’ It must have been really weird for them, but for me it was the most exciting thing ever.
(c) Warner Bros. Pictures
What have been some of the more challenging roles for you to play in your career?
Warwick Davis: The challenges for me always come in the costumes and the makeup. Marvin the paranoid alien in Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy that was a really challenging costume to wear because of the extreme weight. It weighed two thirds of my body weight so having to walk around and give a performance while enduring not only lifting the weight and moving it around but also not being able to see anything. Having video monitors inside and trying to do dialogue. It was an immense challenge and one that I am really am blessed that I got to do it.
Doing the roles I did in Harry Potter like Griphook for example. Fantastic character, brilliant role but really challenging because of the makeup. It was a four hour process with contact lenses and dentures. It was quite heavy makeup as well. Just kind of working under that. Being in the film as much as I was it meant a lot of days, very early mornings.
You know, all of these things are challenges that you don’t anticipate as an actor. I don’t think audiences every really fully appreciate when they watch a movie what goes into just getting a few seconds of performance on screen can sometimes add up to many days of work for a lot of people.
How did you hear about Solo: A Star Wars Story being made?
Warwick Davis: I think as people who work on it, I have been working on all the recent Star Wars films. I think while we were working on The Last Jedi you starting think ‘Well, what’s next?’ and already art departments and the creature effects department are starting to develop stuff for the next movies. You start to kind of hear things and see things in development at that time. So that was the first I heard of it.
You know, I was excited to learn more about this character. I thought Solo was a great story to tell. For me he was one of the more kind of mysterious characters. We knew obviously returning to the Skywalker saga at the moment so we kind of know more about Luke and Leia than we do about Han. I thought that it was really time that they told that story.
(c) Walt Disney Pictures
Were you sworn to any kind of secrecy about your role in Solo: A Star Wars Story?
Warwick Davis: It is funny. When you are a put of these films, it is all top secret all the time. But some being even more secret. For example, I played a few different characters in Solo. But once the film is coming out you can start talking about it. But we wanted the character Weasel and my reveal to be as much of a surprise as we could make it.
I couldn’t talk about in any interviews I was doing before the film came out. And it was great because when I did take the helmet off in that scene in the movie people were generally surprised and delighted which was really nice. And that was how we wanted it. It just shows that even in the age of the internet and social media and movie gossip we can still keep some things secret. It’s not easy to do but it’s always very pleasing when we can do it. Because in the end we aren’t doing it for any other reason than to make the fan movie going experience the very best one that we can.
What did you enjoy most about playing your character in Solo: A Star Wars Story?
Warwick Davis: Well, I tell you what. Originally I was to be a part of Enfys Nest gang. This group of renegades, sort of freedom fighters. I began wondering what am I gonna look like. After lots of discussions with the hair and makeup department and the directors nothing was quite working. It became an issue of making me look different, that was kind of the idea. How can we take the Warwick out of this so he looks different. Then it was like why are we really trying to do that. Why can’t we revisit a character.
It just so happened that Weasel timeline wise worked out really well. I think from the time we shot Phantom Menace to the time we shot Solo the character would have aged that much. The time between the two films was exactly the same. It worked out perfectly, that was the character I could play and this character should be him. I think it made it a lot more interesting. What interests me more is what happened in between. What happened from the character we saw in Phantom Menace. What did he get up to and why did he join Enfys Nest. That for me is a really interesting part of this.
Why do you think people should watch this movie?
Warwick Davis: For me, I think if you want to find out more about Han as a character. He is kind of an elusive character, somebody we don’t know that much about. It is a lot of fun spotting those moments like ‘Oh, that’s why he is like that’ or ‘That’s why he is called that’ and all of these questions, suddenly you’ve got answers to them.
Also, for me these Star Wars story films are very accessible. Particularly Solo is one of those films that you don’t really have to know anything about Star Wars. Believe it or not, there are people out there in this world who have not seen a Star Wars movie. If they were going to start anywhere, this would be the film to start with. Because you can just jump in and you immediately get a flavor for this swashbuckling, fasten your seat belt ride. This exciting adventure story and you get introduced to the characters. It is just a fun introduction to that world of spaceships, blasters and fun characters to spend a couple of hours with.
Solo: A Star Wars Story is available on Blu-Ray combo pack and DVD now. You can follow this movie on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
