Harrison Ford’s personal Star Wars script sells for $20,000
A “totally unique” Star Wars script owned by Harrison Ford has sold for five figures after revealing precious “behind-the-scene” film secrets.
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An original Star Wars script owned by actor Harrison Ford has sold for thousands of dollars owing to the “unique” film secrets it holds.
Excalibur Auctions listed the relic alongside an assortment of personal items Ford, 81, left behind in a London flat he was renting while he filmed at Elstree Studios during 1976.
The script was the fourth draft of the screenplay for the first Star Wars movie A New Hope, originally titled The Adventures of Luke Starkiller, and carried an estimated selling price of $15,000-$23,0000 (£8,000-£12,000).
The auction house in Kings Langley, Hertfordshire, revealed the precious piece of movie history was bought by a private collector from Austria for roughly $20,866 (£10,795).
“A revised fourth draft of STAR WARS EPISODE 1: A NEW HOPE – originally titled here as The Adventures of Luke Star Killer as taken from the “Journal of the Whills” by George Lucas (Saga I) STAR WARS,” the listing read.
“This item came from the home of a family in which Harrison Ford stayed during the filming of Star Wars throughout 1976 and is likely his own copy that was left behind along with other items,” the description continued.
“There were 5 drafts of the first Star Wars script and this 4th revised edition gives an interesting insight into the making of one of the most important blockbuster movies ever made.”
The script is incomplete and unbound, with different coloured pages marking revisions and changes – including scenes and characters which were cut from the final edit.
On page 56, Harrison Ford is introduced as cynical antihero Han Solo, while remaining pages cover when audiences first meet fan-favourite Chewbacca in the cantina and Han Solo’s iconic Millenium Falcon.
Ford shot to fame after starring as Solo in George Lucas’s 1977 groundbreaking science fiction epic. He appeared in the original movie’s sequels, The Empire Strikes Back (1980) and Return Of The Jedi (1983), before reprising the role for The Force Awakens in 2015.
However, the movie script was not the only item Ford left behind.
It is understood the belongings had been tucked away for 50 years in a private home in Notting Hill, London. The owners of the home had rented out the top two floors to Ford after they posted an advertisement in The Sunday Times ‘Flat to Let’ section, according to Excalibur Auctions’ website.
In a description about the Star Wars memorabilia, the owners recounted they “didn’t know anything about film stars or celebrities and didn’t know who Harrison Ford was,” and were surprised to find out about their tenant’s fame after a cleaning lady met Ford one day and fainted.
Star Wars co-stars Carrie Fisher, who played Princess Leia, and Mark Hamill, who played Luke Skywalker, also visited the apartment, although the owners also didn’t know who they were at the time, with Hamill referred to simply as “the boy”.
The owners said Ford was a great tenant who sat and drank with them in the backyard, took them plant shopping, and attended their son’s first birthday party.
“He was an ideal tenant! It really was a fun time,” the owners reportedly told the auction house.
Among Ford’s other items included shooting schedules, a call sheet, and collections of notes which sold in a bundle to a UK buyer for $9328 (£4826).
These sheets included a handwritten note which appeared to reference a meeting between Ford and British producer Robert Watts about another famous role for the actor, archaeologist Indiana Jones.
Another item sold was a typed letter from a friend in which Ford is asked about why he has not called his wife, Mary Marquardt, before they divorced in 1979.
Ford would go on to marry E.T. screenwriter Melissa Mathison before they also ended their marriage in 2004. She died in 2015.
Ally McBeal star Calista Flockhart has been Ford’s wife since 2010.
Excalibur Auctions’ auctioneer Jonathan Torode said the story behind the items made them “totally unique”.
“The sale saw competitive bidding from around the globe for these never-before-seen pieces of Star Wars history,” Mr Torode told the Daily Mail.
“Although other copies of this script have come to market previously, this sale saw a new record set for a Star Walker script, which shows how a personal link to the items is so enticing to Star Wars fans.
“The personal provenance makes them totally unique. We hope they will be as treasured by their new owners as much as they were by the previous ones.’
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