CZ-3
Do you know...
It came to me, just a short time ago, that I had never told anyone about the other role I played in Star Wars - A New Hope.
Well, "played" is perhaps, something of an exaggeration. But it happened like this...

I wasn't in this particular shot, or indeed the scene, so was feeling unusually comfortable and relaxed - outside my gold suit for a while. But I knew what the scene was about since I'd read the appropriate page of my script, even though it didn't concern me. I'm good like that. Very professional.

It seemed that in their mission to raise funds to employ that old charmer Han Solo, Luke Skywalker and Obi Wan were regretfully selling Luke's dependable old land speeder. A sad moment but essential for the furtherance of the plot and Harrison Ford's career. For this purpose they had to plumb the depths of scum and villainy in the putrid back streets of Mos Eisley - in reality a back street of Elstree, a turbid satellite in London's gravity field - not exactly putrid but hardly a destination of choice. We were in the studio.

The featured street was constructed on the unyielding concrete floor of a sound stage out of wood and plaster and paint. Tatty on one side. And actually tatty on the other; which was the side the audience would thrill to some months later.

Naturally wood, plaster and paint would have looked a little dull with just Luke and Obi Wan - no slur on their star quality or screen-appeal, of course. But to provide a sense of animation, various crowd artists had been disguised in various, well, disguises. They would throng, generally.

I watched them set up the shot, set on a distant planet where there were clearly humans and machines and humans wearing rubber things to make them look inhumans. Or perhaps, un humans. Or perhaps - aliens. There was even a human, wearing stilts dressed as giant chicken-leg-look-a-likes, who would walk through the shot from the knees down, so to speak. Already cries of, "Colonel Saunders is a'comin!" filled the air, as if the character was a mutant snack, albeit on a rather filling level.

And there I was playing C-3PO - well - not. For the time being.

Now no scene in any Star Wars film would be complete without something mechanical. On this occasion it was to be another scruffy-looking droid, 'White Pointy Face'.

He would have to wait for some years before the demands of merchandising required a more attractive nomenclature, to grace his photo in various encyclopedias and popular role-playing games. But for the moment that description quite adequately covered the pile of assorted body parts that lay on the dusty concrete

"Could you do us a favour?"
It was Norman Reynolds - the Art Department, with one of the assistant directors behind him, for support.
"There's this suit. It's made from your body cast. The one we used for Threepio."
I looked at the heap of white painted plastic and metal. It was not an impressive sight.
"Would you mind wearing it in the scene?"
Whilst not exactly the best offer I'd had all day - actually, it was - and at least they weren't asking me to don the giant chicken legs that were rehearsing, dangerously close by.
Always willing to oblige I picked up the face and studied it,Hamlet-like.

Unlike Yorik, this empty skull had never experience life until now. That was to be my job.

Having performed many other acting roles, besides Threepio, in my short acting career, I did have some idea how to approach another part, at least to be able to sustain it for twenty seconds. And twenty seconds was as long as this character would ultimately exist in the film. He had a function - to fill a space. But who was he? What was he?

The clue was obviously in the face.
I gazed into its grey cross-eyes.
They stared back with a peeved squint, redolent of a sad and traumatized droid-childhood. Clearly this robot had too seen action and was trying not to see any more
Of course I agreed to inhabit him.
Norman and various helpers from the props department covered me up in the costume, most of which was very similar to my yet-to-be-famous gold suit. Norman had redesigned my normal figure-hugging version. Though the legs were the same, White Pointy Face seemed to be wearing nappies - or if we'd been filming in America - diapers. Either way, comfortable but oddly unattractive.

The big difference was the big chest. It was not nearly as clingingly restrictive as my usual outfit. It was great. I could breath. There was almost room inside to swing a cat, or indeed, an Ewok - not that they had been invented then, thank goodness.

The moment came. They gently placed White Pointy Face's face on mine and clamped the back of his head onto mine, as if I were the contents of an exotic Easter egg.

I staggered to my start-mark by the wall, waiting for the stars to pass by - ignoring me. For I was what they call, 'Background.' And they were on a mission.

I thought about the face. Scared. Troubled. Twitchy.
"ACTION!"
I twitched.
The chicken crossed the road.
The stars rolled by.
They ignored me.
"CUT!"
My roll was over. I emerged from seclusion inside the troubled character and left him, a pile of painted plastic on the ground.

White Pointy Face had ceased to be - until later when thrown lifeless behind me, in a corner of the Sandcrawler as I returned to my usual lot in life.

And I never thought to tell anyone about him until I was surprised by his image on a gaming card.

Immortalised by Decipher.

He'd changed his name without telling me.
But now I've told you.
Now you know.
AD