Interview: Garrick Hagon | Star Wars Episode IV – A New Hope [ENGLISH]

In Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope Garrick Hagon played Biggs Darklighter, a friend of Luke Skywalker and an X-Wing Pilot. Although Biggs died in the battle of Yavin he is one of the favorit characters of many Star Wars fans.

At Noris Force Con 7 I had the chance to speak with Garrick Hagon.

You can find the German version of this interview HERE.

Are you enjoying the event and how are you today?

The event has been very good, it’s very full and very busy. Maybe not on Sunday morning as it is now, but they are coming and they are very friendly. It’s quite a joy to be here because I’ve been able to see a little bit of Nürnberg and I also met some very nice people. So, I am very happy, thank you.

Of course it’s been a long time since the first Star Wars movie came out. What was it like back then? Did you expect it to be that big one day and so successful as it is nowadays?

Well, unfortunately I just treated it like another job. It was a nice job. It was an adventure, because we had to go to Tunisia and it was a new experience for me, although I had worked in the desert before, a long time on a film called The Message about [the prophet] Mohammad. But to me it was a job and an exciting one because I had never done  Science Fiction before or Science Fantasy. But it was so real, it was treated like an ordinary film. So my relationship with it was, that there wasn’t any Science Fiction sort of stereotype about it. It was like working on any other film with good actors and particularly working with Mark Hamill and of course we got along very well. And I was is best friend in the script and a pretty good friend outside of the script.

With so many new Star Wars projects coming would you like to return, maybe in a different role?

I would sweep the hangar of the X-Wings. I would do a little work in the background to be in one of the sequels, but I don’t think that’s gonna happen. I wouldn’t need a moustache. I could do it without my moustache. But I don’t think you are going to see me in the background sweeping the hangar.

Yesterday at the panel you mentioned that you know that in one of the comics Biggs had a girlfriend. And I wonder, do you know about the X-Wing novels?

Not the novels. I learned that, because I was reading the comic on the plane. I’ve never read the books. I only got the first in the series, in the Empire series, and I thought „I’m gonna read that comic“ because I had it with me. It had a lot of good dialogue. Sometimes I use that dialogue when I sign photographs. I take a lot out of the comic book. I often sign photographs with a line from the film, but this gave me some new dialogue, but I haven’t signed one relating to this and never had someone pretending to be my girlfriend way back in the day on Tatooine.

So in the X-Wing novels there is a cousin of Biggs Darklighter, Gavin Darklighter. And I always had the feeling that they regretted that Biggs Darklighter was killed in the movie.

Well, I regretted it, but Mark said, because we didn’t know that this would become a whole successful series of films … He said: „You have the best part. You die and in a way … if you die in a film of course people give you some attention. They mourn over you and cry sometimes.” So he thought I had the best part, but it turned out bad. I would rather have stayed alive and had the worst part.

But you made an impact.

I made an impact.

How much from your perspective has the movie industry changed between filming A New Hope and nowadays?

Well, I think technically it has changed so much of course, but I also have the feeling that in the beginning was, as I said, more like a family, with people who know each other. So I have a feeling that we were more related to one another. Because we spent more time with each other. We were together more than the actors nowadays. Nowadays you can act in front of a screen and not even meet the other actor. So we had that family feeling I think, which maybe was because they didn’t do so much technically. We had to create it in real life, as human beings rather than technical objects.

You attend a lot of conventions. What do you like about conventions and how have conventions changed over the years?

Well, they have certainly become bigger. Also it has become more and more industrialized like everything else. Nowadays there are a lot of people at the conventions, that I don’t know because I don’t know the sequels and even the prequels I am not very good on. So I often have to ask „What did you do in Star Wars?“ And it is probably insulting to them, but it is because I haven’t done my research. I am busy elsewhere and I do a lot of other work besides. So I am not that good a historian about Star Wars.

But it is a big universe, always expanding.

Oh it’s always expanding and I am shrinking.

You are also busy voice acting. What do you like about voice acting and how does it compare to acting?

Well, first of all, when you are reading a lot of books, you are playing a lot of characters, which is fun. Also it is a very good technical exercise because you learn to get around words quite quickly because you have to record while you are doing your voice work.

But now I am really directing audio. I direct books. So I am meeting people who I would have never had the chance to if they had never written a book. I’ve just been working with the inventor of Wikipedia. And so I get the chance to meet online people that I probably would have never met if I hadn’t been an audio director.

I worked with a German director just recently, a wonderful man called Werner Herzog. I have worked with him now three times on three different books. It’s a privilege. And I have worked with Diana the Princess of Wales‘ brother, Charles Spencer. People like that. They have written books and I have directed them. It’s a privilege.

What are your hopes for the future of the Star Wars universe …?

Well, I’d like to keep it human. And real. But I can’t complain until I have seen the sequels. I am told, that Andor is the best. I want to see that now and to see the quality and I want to see if they have the same passion and humanity as we had in A New Hope.

Thank you very much for taking time.

It’s been a pleasure.