Anthony Daniels

Anthony was lucky enough to have been born with a vocation. Unfortunately, it was a vocation to be an actor. But England in the 60’s was not a land where acting was considered a safe profession, so parental influence guided him to a real career – the law.

Two years of study proved Anthony didn’t want to be a lawyer. So he took a small bequest and turned it into his ticket to acting school for the next three years. He was lucky to have excellent teachers in the mime and radio departments, two fields of art that would be very useful in the future.

Leaving college in 1974, Anthony won a BBC Radio Award, which gave him a place in their Drama Company. After hundreds of productions, he left to go into theatre, shortly joining the National Theatre of Great Britain at The Young Vic. It was whilst playing in Stoppard’s Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead (a play about two minor characters shoved around by events much bigger than themselves), that he got the call to meet George Lucas about a sci-fi movie.

Given the difficulties of the proposed costume, Lucas was interested in Anthony’s acting and mime skills. Anthony on the other hand wasn’t interested at all. Having once asked for his money back on seeing 2001 – A Space Odyssey, he had never been attracted by the world of sci-fi. He refused the interview, not wishing to waste Lucas’s time.

His older and wiser agent ensured that he did meet the director. It was a Ralph McQuarrie’s concept painting of the character that really grabbed his interest and, having read the script, he was thrilled to be given the role.

The next day he was covered in plaster to make a mould of his body, the first step in creating the now globally recognised character. Six months later the costume was almost ready and filming began.

It wasn’t an easy shoot for Anthony. The seventeen pieces of the amazing gold suit didn’t quite fit him, or each other. It was cold in the desert scenes and boiling in Elstree studio during the hottest summer on record. His companion, R2D2, was speechless during filming – the sounds added in post-production by Ben Burtt, so Anthony spent weeks talking to himself. Lucas later worked to replace Anthony’s on-set vocal performance with a more American one. Eventually he found nothing fitted the original like the original and generously asked Anthony to dub his own character voice back onto the edited film.

The success of A New Hope leads to the sequels. So with some adjustments to the suit, Anthony found himself happily filming The Empire Strikes Back and The Return of the Jedi. His participation in The Phantom Menace was as an off-camera voice; not a satisfying method of characterisation, so he took over the arduous puppetry of the ‘naked’ C-3PO for Attack Of  The Clones, once again providing live action and voice. Fully gold and shining in Episode III, The Revenge of the Sith, The Force Awakens (albeit with a red arm), Rogue One and The Last Jedi. With The Rise of Skywalker, Anthony is the only actor to work on all ten Star Wars films as C-3PO and, briefly, as Tak in Solo. He shone briefly again, but significantly, in Ahsoka

Anthony has been involved in many of the spin-offs. Amongst other events, as the character he performed in the three radio dramatisations of the original trilogy, tap-danced on The Muppet Show, promoted measles and polio vaccines, wrote and produced anti-smoking commercials, danced with Donny and Marie Osmond, took part in the Oscar Ceremonies, befriended Big Bird on Sesame Street filmed and voiced his animated figure as the pilot in Disney’s ride, Star Tours-The Adventures Continue, became a breakfast cereal, Kellogg’s C-3POs, and had his own cartoon series, Droids. The Clone Wars, LEGO-The Yoda Chronicles, Droid Tales and Rebels are some of the other animated series he has voiced, as well as the WAZE and TomTom GPS satnav devices.

Anthony has written extensively about his experiences especially in his ‘New Improved Wonder Column’ in the original Star Wars Insider magasine. He produced his first comic book for Dark Horse, The Protocol Offensive. His writing skills were harnessed by Hasbro Interactive for their Star Wars Monopoly. In 2019 he published his memoires of his film experiences in “I AM C-3PO –  The Inside Story”.

Although the Star Wars saga has formed a major part of Anthony’s career, he has interspersed those movies with a variety of television and stage appearances. These range from situation comedies such as Square Deal and Three Up Two Down to more serious dramas such as Prime Suspect and Priestly’s Dangerous Corner.

Anthony also works as a presenter/producer of trade events and conferences. He has worked as a producer/creative designer on The Westminster Experience, The Guinness Taste Sensation, Singapore’s Volcanoland. Bahrain’s Magic Island, Dubai’s Encounter Zone and The London Dungeon.

Anthony has been proud to present the Art of Star Wars and Star Wars – Where Science Meets Imagination and The Power of Costume exhibitions in their various locations around the world. He has hosted and narrated various symphonic events, especially Star Wars In Concert in its American and European and Japanese tours. He even conducted the London Symphony Orchestra and the Boston Pops – as C-3PO.

Anthony lives in England and the south of France.

Contact:
droidrelations@gmail.com
Twitter ADaniels3PO
Instagram @anthonydanielsofficial