George Lucas

Lucas saw many inspiring films in class, particularly the visual films coming out of the National Film Board of Canada like Arthur Lipsett's 21-87, cameraman Jean-Claude Labrecque's cinéma vérité 60 Cycles, the work of Norman McLaren, and the documentaries of Claude Jutra. Lucas fell madly in love with pure cinema and quickly became prolific at making 16 mm nonstory noncharacter visual tone poems and cinéma vérité with such titles as Look at Life, Herbie, 1:42.08, The Emperor, Anyone Lived in a Pretty (how) Town, Filmmaker, and 6-18-67. He was passionate and interested in camerawork and editing, defining himself as a filmmaker as opposed to being a director, and he loved making abstract visual films that created emotions purely through cinema.[14]

In 1967, Lucas re-enrolled as a USC graduate student in film production.[17] He began working under Verna Fields for the United States Information Agency, where he met his future wife Marcia Griffin.[18] Working as a teaching instructor for a class of U.S. Navy students who were being taught documentary cinematography, Lucas directed the short film Electronic Labyrinth: THX 1138 4EB, which won first prize at the 1967–68 National Student film festival. Lucas was awarded a student scholarship by Warner Bros. to observe and work on the making of a film of his choosing. The film he chose was Finian's Rainbow (1968) which was being directed by Francis Ford Coppola, who was revered among film school students of the time as a cinema graduate who had "made it" in Hollywood. In 1969, Lucas was one of the camera operators on the classic Rolling Stones concert film Gimme Shelter.

In 1969, Lucas co-founded the studio American Zoetrope with Coppola, hoping to create a liberating environment for filmmakers to direct outside the perceived oppressive control of the Hollywood studio system.[19] Coppola thought Lucas's Electronic Labyrinth could be adapted into his first full-length feature film,[20] which was produced by American Zoetrope as THX 1138, but was not a success. Lucas then created his own company, Lucasfilm, Ltd., and directed the successful American Graffiti (1973).

Lucas then set his sights on adapting Flash Gordon, an adventure serial from his childhood that he fondly remembered. When he was unable to obtain the rights, he set out to write an original space adventure that would eventually become Star Wars.[21] Despite his success with his previous film, all but one studio turned Star Wars down. It was only because Alan Ladd, Jr., at 20th Century Fox liked American Graffiti that he forced through a production and distribution deal for the film, which ended up restoring Fox to financial stability after a number of flops.[22] Star Wars was significantly influenced by samurai films of Akira Kurosawa, Spaghetti Westerns, as well as classic sword and sorcery fantasy stories.

Star Wars quickly became the highest-grossing film of all-time, displaced five years later by Spielberg's E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. After the success of American Graffiti and prior to the beginning of filming on Star Wars, Lucas was encouraged to renegotiate for a higher fee for writing and directing Star Wars than the US$150,000 agreed.[9] He declined to do so, instead negotiating for advantage in some of the as-yet-unspecified parts of his contract with Fox, in particular, ownership of licensing and merchandising rights (for novelizations, clothing, toys, etc.) and contractual arrangements for sequels.[9][23] Lucasfilm has earned hundreds of millions of dollars from licensed games, toys, and collectibles created for the franchise.[9]

The original Star Wars film went through a tumultuous production, and during editing, Lucas suffered chest pains initially feared to be a heart attack, but actually a fit of hypertension and exhaustion. The effort that Lucas exerted during post-production for the film, and its subsequent sequels, caused strains on his relationship with his wife Marcia Lucas, and was a contributing factor to their divorce at the end of the trilogy.[21] The success of the first Star Wars film also resulted in more attention focused on Lucas, both positive and negative, attracting wealth and fame but also many people who wanted Lucas's financial backing or just to threaten him.[24]

Director Jim Henson (left) and Lucas working on Labyrinth in 1986

Following the release of the first Star Wars film, Lucas worked extensively as a writer and producer, including on the many Star Wars spinoffs made for film, television, and other media. Lucas acted as executive producer for the next two Star Wars films, commissioning Irvin Kershner to direct The Empire Strikes Back, and Richard Marquand to direct Return of the Jedi, while receiving a story credit on the former and sharing a screenwriting credit with Lawrence Kasdan on the latter.[25] Lucas also gave away his writing story credit out of great respect for Leigh Brackett for The Empire Strikes Back after her death from cancer.[26] He also acted as story writer and executive producer on all four of the Indiana Jones films, which his colleague and good friend Steven Spielberg directed.

Craig Barron, who worked at ILM as part of the matte painting department, told Star Wars Insider that Lucas liked to spend time with the department's painters and often spoke of what movies he wanted to make. According to Barron, Lucas had wanted to make a film about Alexander the Great, but this film was ultimately never produced.[27] Projects where Lucas credited as executive producer and sometimes story writer in this period include Kurosawa's Kagemusha (1980), Twice Upon A Time (1983), Ewoks: Caravan of Courage (1984), Ewoks: Battle for Endor (1985), Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters (1985), Jim Henson's Labyrinth (1986), Don Bluth's The Land Before Time (1988), and the Indiana Jones television spinoff The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles (1992–96). There were unsuccessful projects, however, including More American Graffiti (1979), Willard Huyck's Howard the Duck (1986), which was the biggest flop of Lucas's career, Ron Howard's Willow (1988), Coppola's Tucker: The Man and His Dream (1988), and Mel Smith's Radioland Murders (1994).

The animation studio Pixar was founded in 1979 as the Graphics Group, one third of the Computer Division of Lucasfilm. Pixar's early computer graphics research resulted in groundbreaking effects in films such as Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan[28] and Young Sherlock Holmes,[28] and the group was purchased in 1986 by Steve Jobs shortly after he left Apple Computer. Jobs paid Lucas $5 million and put $5 million as capital into the company. The sale reflected Lucas's desire to stop the cash flow losses from his seven-year research projects associated with new entertainment technology tools, as well as his company's new focus on creating entertainment products rather than tools. As of June 1983, Lucas was worth $60 million,[29] but he met cash-flow difficulties following his divorce that year, concurrent with the sudden dropoff in revenues from Star Wars licenses following the theatrical run of Return of the Jedi. At this point, Lucas had no desire to return to Star Wars, and had unofficially canceled the sequel trilogy.[30]

Also in 1983, Lucas and Tomlinson Holman founded the audio company THX Ltd.[31] The company was formerly owned by Lucasfilm and contains equipment for stereo, digital, and theatrical sound for films, and music. Skywalker Sound and Industrial Light & Magic, are the sound and visual effects subdivisions of Lucasfilm, while Lucasfilm Games, later renamed LucasArts, produces products for the gaming industry.

Lucas receiving the National Medal of Technology and Innovation from President George W. Bush, February 2006

Having lost much of his fortune in a divorce settlement in 1987, Lucas was reluctant to return to Star Wars.[30] However, the prequels, which were still only a series of basic ideas partially pulled from his original drafts of "The Star Wars", continued to tantalize him with technical possibilities that would make it worthwhile to revisit his older material. When Star Wars became popular once again, in the wake of Dark Horse's comic book line and Timothy Zahn's trilogy of spin-off novels, Lucas realized that there was still a large audience. His children were older, and with the explosion of CGI technology he began to consider directing once again.[32]

By 1993, it was announced, in Variety among other sources, that Lucas would be making the prequels. He began penning more to the story, indicating that the series would be a tragic one, examining Anakin Skywalker's fall to the dark side. Lucas also began to change the status of the prequels relative to the originals; at first, they were supposed to be a "filling-in" of history tangential to the originals, but now he saw that they could form the beginning of one long story that started with Anakin's childhood and ended with his death. This was the final step towards turning the film series into a "Saga".[33] In 1994, Lucas began work on the screenplay of the first prequel, tentatively titled Episode I: The Beginning.

In 1997, to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Star Wars, Lucas returned to the original trilogy and made numerous modifications using newly available digital technology, releasing them in theaters as the Star Wars Trilogy: Special Edition. For DVD releases in 2004 and Blu-ray releases in 2011 (and afterwards the 4K releases that were eventually later released in 2019), the trilogy received further revisions to make them congruent with the prequel trilogy. Besides the additions to the Star Wars franchise, Lucas released a Director's Cut of THX 1138 in 2004, with the film re-cut and containing a number of CGI revisions.

George Lucas, Berlin 2005 (Portrait by Oliver Mark)

The first Star Wars prequel was finished and released in 1999 as Episode I – The Phantom Menace, which would be the first film Lucas had directed in over two decades. Following the release of the first prequel, Lucas announced that he would also be directing the next two, and began working on Episode II.[34] The first draft of Episode II was completed just weeks before principal photography, and Lucas hired Jonathan Hales, a writer from The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, to polish it.[35] It was completed and released in 2002 as Attack of the Clones. The final prequel, Episode III – Revenge of the Sith, began production in 2002[36] and was released in 2005. Numerous fans and critics considered the prequels inferior to the original trilogy,[37][38][39] though they were box office successes.[40][41][42] In 2004, Lucas reflected that his transition from independent to corporate filmmaker mirrored the story of Star Wars character Darth Vader in some ways.[43]

Lucas in 2007

Lucas collaborated with Jeff Nathanson as a writer of the 2008 film Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, directed by Steven Spielberg. Like the Star Wars prequels, the reception was mixed, with numerous fans and critics once again considering it inferior to its predecessors. From 2008 to 2014, Lucas also served as the creator and executive producer and for a second Star Wars animated series on Cartoon Network, Star Wars: The Clone Wars which premiered with a feature film of the same name before airing its first episode. The supervising director for this animated series was Dave Filoni, who was chosen by Lucas and closely collaborated with him on its development.[44][45][46][47][48] This series bridged the events between Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, and featured the last Star Wars stories in which Lucas was involved in a major way.

In 2012, Lucas served as executive producer for Red Tails, a war film based on the exploits of the Tuskegee Airmen during World War II. He also took over direction of reshoots while director Anthony Hemingway worked on other projects.

In January 2012, Lucas announced his retirement from producing large blockbuster films and instead re-focusing his career on smaller, independently budgeted features.[49][50][51]

In June 2012, it was announced that producer Kathleen Kennedy, a long-term collaborator with Steven Spielberg and a producer of the Indiana Jones films, had been appointed as co-chair of Lucasfilm Ltd.[52][53] It was reported that Kennedy would work alongside Lucas, who would remain chief executive and serve as co-chairman for at least one year, after which she would succeed him as the company's sole leader.[52][53] With the sale of Lucasfilm to Disney, Lucas is currently Disney's second-largest single shareholder, after the estate of Steve Jobs.[54]

Lucas worked as a creative consultant on the Star Wars sequel trilogy's first film, The Force Awakens.[55] As creative consultant on the film, Lucas's involvement included attending early story meetings; according to Lucas, "I mostly say, 'You can't do this. You can do that.' You know, 'The cars don't have wheels. They fly with antigravity.' There's a million little pieces ... I know all that stuff."[56] Lucas's son Jett told The Guardian that his father was "very torn" about having sold the rights to the franchise, despite having hand-picked Abrams to direct, and that his father was "there to guide" but that "he wants to let it go and become its new generation."[57] Among the materials turned over to the production team were rough story treatments Lucas developed when he considered creating episodes VII–IX himself years earlier; in January 2015, Lucas stated that Disney had discarded his story ideas.[58][59]

Lucas with Secretary of State John Kerry in Washington, D.C., on December 5, 2015

The Force Awakens, directed by J. J. Abrams, was released on December 18, 2015. Kathleen Kennedy executive produced the film and its sequels.[60][61] The new sequel trilogy was jointly produced by Lucasfilm and The Walt Disney Company, which had acquired Lucasfilm in 2012.[62] During an interview with talk show host and journalist Charlie Rose that aired on December 24, 2015, Lucas likened his decision to sell Lucasfilm to Disney to a divorce and outlined the creative differences between him and the producers of The Force Awakens. Lucas went on to say that he needed to support the company and its employees who were going to suffer financially.[63] Lucas described the previous six Star Wars films as his "children" and defended his vision for them, while criticizing The Force Awakens for having a "retro feel", saying, "I worked very hard to make them completely different, with different planets, with different spaceships – you know, to make it new." Lucas also drew some criticism and subsequently apologized for his remark likening Disney to "white slavers".[64][65]

In 2015, Lucas wrote the CGI film Strange Magic, his first musical. The film was produced at Skywalker Ranch. Gary Rydstrom directed the movie.[66] At the same time the sequel trilogy was announced, a fifth installment of the Indiana Jones series also entered pre-development phase with Harrison Ford and Steven Spielberg set to return. Lucas originally did not specify whether the selling of Lucasfilm would affect his involvement with the film. In October 2016, Lucas announced his decision to not be involved in the story of the film but would remain an executive producer.[67][68] In 2016, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, the first film of a Star Wars anthology series was released. It told the story of the rebels who stole the plans for the Death Star featured in the original Star Wars film, and it was reported that Lucas liked it more than The Force Awakens.[69] The Last Jedi, the second film in the sequel trilogy, was released in 2017; Lucas described the film as "beautifully made".[70]

Lucas has had cursory involvement with Solo: A Star Wars Story (2018),[71][72] the Star Wars streaming series The Mandalorian,[73] and the premiere of the eighth season of Game of Thrones.[74] Lucas met with J. J. Abrams before the latter began writing the script to the sequel trilogy's final film, The Rise of Skywalker, which was released in 2019.[75]

Lucas was also heavily involved and invested in the scoring process for the original Star Wars soundtrack, which was composed by John Williams, on the recommendation of his friend and colleague Steven Spielberg. Whilst initially wanting to use tracks and film music in a similar manner to 2001: A Space Odyssey, which served as the inspiration for the film, Williams advised against this and instead proposed a system of recurring themes (or leitmotifs) to enhance the story in the style of classical composers Gustav Holst, William Walton, and Igor Stravinsky; works that Lucas had used as "temp tracks" for Williams to gain inspiration from.[76][77] The film, and subsequent sequels and prequels, make use of the Main Title Theme, the Force Theme (less commonly referred to as Obi Wan Kenobi's Theme), the Rebel Alliance Theme, and Princess Leia's Theme (all introduced in this film) repeatedly. Subsequent films also added to the catalogue of themes for different characters, factions, and locations.

The score was released to critical acclaim and won Williams his third Academy Award for Best Original Score. The score was listed by the American Film Institute in 2005 as the greatest film score of all time. The professional relationship formed by Lucas and Williams extended through to Williams working on all of Lucas's blockbuster franchise movies: the remaining two films of the Star Wars original trilogy; all three films of prequel trilogy developed over fifteen years later; and the four (to be five) films of the Indiana Jones franchise, in which Williams reunited with his long-time collaborator Spielberg. In his collaborations with Lucas, Williams received six of his fifty-two Academy Award nominations (Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade). After Lucas sold Lucasfilm to Disney, Williams stayed on board with the franchise, and continued to score the remaining three films of the "Skywalker saga" (The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi, and The Rise of Skywalker, for which he received a further three Oscar nominations), after which he announced his "retirement" from the series.[78]

Lucas was in attendance for a ceremony honouring Williams as the 44th recipient of the AFI Life Achievement Award, the first composer to receive the honour, and gave a speech in praise of their relationship and his work.[79] In interviews, and most famously at the 40th Anniversary Star Wars Celebration convention, Lucas has repeatedly reaffirmed the importance of Williams to the Star Wars saga, affectionately referring to him as the "secret sauce" of his movies.[80]

In 1991, The George Lucas Educational Foundation was founded as a nonprofit operating foundation to celebrate and encourage innovation in schools. The foundation's content is available under the brand Edutopia, in an award-winning web site, social media and via documentary films. Lucas, through his foundation, was one of the leading proponents of the E-rate program in the universal service fund,[85] which was enacted as part of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. On June 24, 2008, Lucas testified before the United States House of Representatives subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet as the head of his Foundation to advocate for a free wireless broadband educational network.[86]

In 2012, Lucas sold Lucasfilm to The Walt Disney Company for a reported sum of $4.05 billion.[62] It was widely reported at the time that Lucas intends to give the majority of the proceeds from the sale to charity.[87][88] A spokesperson for Lucasfilm said, "George Lucas has expressed his intention, in the event the deal closes, to donate the majority of the proceeds to his philanthropic endeavors."[88] Lucas also spoke on the matter: "For 41 years, the majority of my time and money has been put into the company. As I start a new chapter in my life, it is gratifying that I have the opportunity to devote more time and resources to philanthropy."[88]

By June 2013, Lucas was considering establishing a museum, the Lucas Cultural Arts Museum, to be built on Crissy Field near the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, which would display his collection of illustrations and pop art, with an estimated value of more than $1 billion. Lucas offered to pay the estimated $300 million cost of constructing the museum, and would endow it with $400 million when it opened, eventually adding an additional $400 million to its endowment.[89] After being unable to reach an agreement with The Presidio Trust, Lucas turned to Chicago.[90] A potential lakefront site on Museum Campus in Chicago was proposed in May 2014.[91] By June 2014, Chicago had been selected, pending approval of the Chicago Plan Commission,[92] which was granted.[93] The museum project was renamed the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art.[94] On June 24, 2016, Lucas announced that he was abandoning his plans to locate the museum in Chicago, due to a lawsuit by a local preservation group, Friends of the Parks, and would instead build the museum in California.[95] On January 17, 2017, Lucas announced that the museum will be constructed in Exposition Park, Los Angeles, California.[96]

In 2005, Lucas gave $1 million to help build the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., to commemorate American civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.[97]

On September 19, 2006, the University of Southern California announced that Lucas had donated $175–180 million to his alma mater to expand the film school. It is the largest single donation to USC and the largest gift to a film school anywhere.[98] Previous donations led to the already-existing George Lucas Instructional Building and Marcia Lucas Post-Production building.[99][100]

In 2013, Lucas and his wife Mellody Hobson donated $25 million to the Chicago-based not-for-profit After School Matters, of which Hobson is the chair.[90]

On April 15, 2016, it was reported that Lucas had donated between $501,000 and $1 million through the Lucas Family Foundation to the Obama Foundation, which is charged with overseeing the construction of the Barack Obama Presidential Center on Chicago's South Side.[101]

• Jones, Brian Jay (2016). George Lucas: A Life. New York City: Little, Brown and Company. ISBN 978-0316257442.
• Kaminski, Michael (2008). The Secret History of Star Wars. Legacy Books Press. ISBN 978-0978465230.
• Rinzler, J.W. (2007). The Making of Star Wars: The Definitive Story Behind the Original Film. LucasBooks. ISBN 978-0345494764.