Christopher Lee graced the screens with his performances as menacing villains in several notable projects. The late actor delighted his fans when his career saw a resurgence after appearing as Saruman in Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. Following that he also appeared as the villainous Count Dooku in Star Wars: Episode II- Attack of the Clones (2002).
Lee’s performance as Count Dooku was one of the rarest positive elements in the much-criticized Prequel Trilogy. But the late actor did not seem to have a very good experience during the filming. Additionally, despite a good performance, a certain section of fans believe that Count Dooku is the most underutilized Star Wars villain.
Did the late Christopher Lee hate his time on Star Wars?
George Lucas waited for a long time for the CGI to evolve enough before returning to the Star Wars universe with the Prequel Trilogy. The successor to the Original Trilogy made intensive use of Blue Screen Technology and other visual effects for the world-building of the space-opera franchise. Christopher Lee made it evident across his interviews that it was not a smooth experience for him.
In an interview with BBC News, the late Master of Macabre revealed that it was a challenging task to execute the fight scenes using the blue screen technology. He suggested that a person must have a vivid imagination to fight against imaginary foes in an imaginary environment.
“You have to have a pretty vivid imagination because he isn’t there.”
Even though the British acting legend considered himself fortunate to have survived a new era of cinema, it was evident that he was not a fan of the technology. In the Special Featurette from Star Wars‘ complete Blue Ray saga (via YouTube), Christopher Lee compared the technology with “magic”.
On the other hand, fellow cast members Hayden Christensen and Ewan McGregor, who played Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi also claimed it to be very difficult.
Why did Christopher Lee speak so little in his Dracula films?
Before making a name for Saruman or Count Dooku, Christopher Lee was widely popular for his performance as Dracula in Hammer Horror films. Yet the ardent fans must have noticed that the late star had very little dialogue in his works in those horror projects. While the first film had some dialogue in the first half, Lee did not have anything to say in the sequel Dracula: Prince of Darkness.
According to an old interview (via /Film) of the Hobbit trilogy fame, the dialogues in the sequel “were literally unsayable”. He complained that the lines were laugh-inducing. Christopher Lee added that the lines were not even close to Bram Stoker’s novel and he often had a creative conflict with Hammer for that.
“[My lines] were not Bram Stoker. This was a great fight I used to have over the years with Hammer. I kept on saying, ‘Why don’t you use Stoker’s words, Stoker’s dialogue?’ if you like. Oh no no no. So somebody used to write lines like, ‘I am the apocalypse,’ beyond belief.”
Several fans may wonder why the late actor continued to work for 7 Hammer Horror movies despite hating them. In another interview (via YouTube) he shared that he actually rejected all the Dracula films except the first two. However, he did not want to put so many people working in the films out of jobs- “am I going to be responsible for putting 90-100 people out of work?”
The World War II veteran asserted that it was not for money and he chose to support the people working at Hammer Film Productions and continued doing the films even after hating them.
All the Star Wars films can be streamed on Disney+ and Christopher Lee’s Dracula can be rented on Apple TV+.
