“The way Mark Hamill remembers it, it was during a production of The Elephant Man (”or maybe Amadeus”). It was the early ‘80s, just after the Empire had struck back, and he was up there on stage, contorting his body in the classic John Merrick style (or composing music), when he noticed something in the audience. Something glowing. Back then, years before mobile phones, audiences simply didn’t glow. “Someone was wearing a home-made shirt with all the Star Wars stuff on it,” he recalls. “It was battery operated, lit up and very distracting. The usher said to me, “I’ve been doing this for 40 years and I never imagined I would have to say, ‘Madam, would you mind turning off your blouse?”
Hamill laughs. It says a lot about his near 40-year relationship with Star Wars that this is one of the most trying incidents he can remember. “People say, ‘Oh, it must be such a drag to be associated with one single thing,’ but it’s such a positive,” he says. “It can be taxing when you’re trying to focus on other things and it’s the 800lb gorilla in the room…but it’s a warm, cuddly gorilla.”
Mark Hamill interview, Empire issue 319, January 2016.