Revenge of the Sith marks the conclusion of George Lucas’ prequel trilogy of Star Wars movies. The 2005 movie cemented Anakin Skywalker’s fall to the dark side while setting up the events of the original trilogy. As a result, the film had plenty of ground to cover in a short amount of screen time. However, Lucas originally had a much longer cut of the film on hand.
According to Matthew Wood, who voiced General Grievous in the film, the original cut for the Revenge of the Sith would have made it one of the longest films in the franchise. However, Lucas eventually managed to trim the fat and reduce the film’s length. Here is what Wood had to say about the film’s original cut and his role as General Grievous.
Matthew Wood Talked About Watching Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith‘s Original Cut
Matthew Wood originally worked as a sound engineer and sound editor at Lucasfilm, contributing to the first and second installments of the prequel trilogy. However, for the third and final part, Revenge of the Sith, he also served as the voice actor for General Grievous, a powerful Kaleesh cyborg who had mastered the art of lightsaber duels.
During an interview in 2005, Wood spoke about working on Revenge of the Sith, revealing that he was one of the first people to watch a rough cut of the film. Wood revealed that he had to queue gaps for the dialog of a digital character. As a result, he was given an early cut to skim over.
It was close to 4 hours at least. I was just sitting there and thought ‘wow, I’m the first one!’. Even George hadn’t see the full movie then.
Wood made the above statement expressing his excitement over watching the four-hour-long cut of the film, which would have made it the longest entry in the entire franchise.
However, from Wood’s words, it is evident that the cut was still being worked upon by editors at the time he watched it. As a result, it is safe to say that four hours was never intended to be the final length of the movie. Revenge of the Sith had a final runtime of 140 minutes, which was even smaller than the 142-minute runtime of its predecessor.
Matthew Wood Revealed How He Was Cast as General Grievous in Revenge of the Sith
During the same interview, Wood also spoke about voicing the character of General Grievous in the film. Wood had previously played some minor characters in the earlier prequels, including the role of Jabba’s henchman Bib Fortuna. However, Grievous was his most meaty role in the franchise yet.
Wood revealed that he had sent an anonymous tape to producer Rick McCallum after an open casting call had been sent out for the role. The sound engineer added that he already knew what director George Lucas wanted for the character having helped devise Grievous’s speech pattern.
I said he should tell George, so he called George and said it was my voice. George called me then and asked me to come over and record it.
Wood made the above statement explaining how he told McCallum that the tape selected for the role was actually his voice.
Thus, Wood was cast as the voice of General Grievous, a role he would reprise in the Clone Wars animated series and several other Star Wars projects. Wood also reprised the role of Bib Fortuna for episodes of The Mandalorian and The Book of Boba Fett, while also working as a sound editor on other projects in the franchise.
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