Christoper Walken, back on the big screen in Dune: Part Two, has spoken again about his audition for Han Solo for the original 1977 Star Wars film, and shares his screen test was opposite Jodie Foster as Princess Leia.
“I think it was for Han Solo,” Walken remembered. “Yes, I auditioned for it. And if I’m not mistaken, my partner in the audition was — I think this is true — it was Jodie Foster … I think we did a screen test. I’m not sure we did a scene. Maybe we just sat in front of, in those days, those old videotape cameras … I did audition for ‘Star Wars,’ but so did about 500 other actors. It was lots of people doing that.”
Foster was reading for Princess Leia, a role that George Lucas actually offered her at the time. The two-time Oscar winner recently said on “The Tonight Show” that she had to turn the “Star Wars” offer down because she was already locked into a contract for a Disney movie at the time. Foster did not reveal what Disney movie, but the timeline suggests it might’ve been “Freaky Friday,” which was released a year before “Star Wars.”
“They were going for a younger Princess Leia but I had a conflict,” said Foster, who was only 13 or 14 years old when “Star Wars” was filming. “I was doing a Disney movie and I just didn’t want to pull out of the Disney movie because I was already under contract.”
The role ultimately went to Carrie Fisher, who was 19 years old during filming. Walken didn’t get the role of Han Solo, either, as that character went to Harrison Ford. Not that Walken was hurting for roles at the time. Not getting “Star Wars” allowed him to say yes to Woody Allen’s “Annie Hall,” which won best picture. A year later he’d star in “The Deer Hunter,” which won him an Oscar.
“I mean, I auditioned for ‘Love Story,’ for ‘Star Wars.’ But it’s probably just as well that I didn’t get either one of them,” Walken told Vanity Fair.
Dune: Part Two is now playing in cinemas worldwide.
