Use the farce, Luke: Mark Hamill is the prankster we need
Lucasfilm's month-long charity sweepstakes, Force for Change, is drawing to a close. And the Star Wars family is going to great lengths to make sure you enter.
There's a theme emerging in these videos: surprising Star Wars fans with their idols in the flesh is one of the most heartwarming and hilarious things you can imagine. (We know, you can imagine quite a bit.)
First we had John Boyega photobombing fans at a Star Wars Celebration photoshoot in Orlando last month. Now Mark Hamill steps in to play Candid Camera — and it's no surprise to find that such a role fits his personality perfectly.
The fact that Hamill's second most famous role after Luke Skywalker is The Joker, which he voiced in the Batman animated series, should give you a clue: Hamill loves to play the prankster.
(In fact, if there are any producers out there looking to revive Candid Camera, Hamill would make an excellent modern-day Allen Funt.)
He also genuinely loves the fans, a fact that became clear at Celebration. Hamill basically performed group therapy to combat his grief for Carrie Fisher, in a performance that was as intimate and off-the-cuff as it was moving.
And when two fans turned the tables and surprised him with a wedding proposal, the delight and joy on Hamill's face was brighter than a double sunset.
Topics Star Wars
Chris is a veteran tech, entertainment and culture journalist, author of 'How Star Wars Conquered the Universe,' and co-host of the Doctor Who podcast 'Pull to Open.' Hailing from the U.K., Chris got his start as a sub editor on national newspapers. He moved to the U.S. in 1996, and became senior news writer for Time.com a year later. In 2000, he was named San Francisco bureau chief for Time magazine. He has served as senior editor for Business 2.0, and West Coast editor for Fortune Small Business and Fast Company. Chris is a graduate of Merton College, Oxford and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. He is also a long-time volunteer at 826 Valencia, the nationwide after-school program co-founded by author Dave Eggers. His book on the history of Star Wars is an international bestseller and has been translated into 11 languages.