The Making of Star Wars

This article is about the documentary. You may be looking for the book.

The Making of Star Wars is an hour-long television special, produced and directed by Robert Guenette, which originally aired on the ABC Television Network on September 16, 1977. Star Wars producer Gary Kurtz acted as Executive Producer for the special.

The special features interviews with the writers, producers, and cast members of Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, including Kurtz, George Lucas, Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Peter Cushing and Alec Guinness; and is hosted by C-3PO (voiced by Anthony Daniels) and R2-D2 (performed by Kenny Baker), with voiceover narration by William Conrad. The show was produced by 20th Century Fox Television in association with the Star Wars Corporation (one of the original early names for Lucasfilm Ltd.).

1 Home video release
2 Alternate version
3 Notes and references
4 External links

Home video releaseEdit

The special was the first Star Wars material to be released to the home video market in 1979 by Magnetic Video. It was reissued on video in 1980 with a trailer for The Empire Strikes Back, which had been released that year. This trailer was not featured on the DVD box set issued in 2004.

In 1982, it was reissued to video by 20th Century Fox on VHS, Betamax, CED, and Laserdisc as part of a double feature with the 1980 special SPFX: The Empire Strikes Back. It was reissued separately in Japan on Laserdisc in 1992, and was reissued as a triple feature with SPFX and the 1983 special Classic Creatures: Return of the Jedi. It has not been reissued in any video format in the United States since then. However, it is scheduled to return to home media as part of the upcoming Star Wars saga Blu-Ray box set.^[1]

Alternate versionEdit

In 1995, this special was released on VHS as a mail-in offer with the Kellogg Company to tie-in with the last video and laserdisc releases of the original versions of the original trilogy. This version is identical to the 1977 version but replaces William Conrad's voiceover with that of Don LaFontaine. This version has not been issued on DVD nor any other format.

Some portions of the special were recently edited into The Story of Star Wars, a VideoNow release that was also released on DVD as a promotional bonus at Wal-Mart stores alongside the DVD release of Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith.