Revenge Of The Sith's Darth Plagueis Story Scene Had A Major Last-Minute Change
The three "Star Wars" prequel films made by George Lucas from 1999 to 2005 detail the story of Anakin Skywalker as he transforms from an idealistic young engineer (played by Jake Lloyd) into an impetuous and angry young man (played by Hayden Christiansen), and eventually into a corrupted and tyrannical killer. Anakin is infused by the Force (a psychic field accessed by microscopic creatures living inside his body called midi-chlorians), so he is in high demand by both the benevolent Jedi Order and the insidious Sith.
Partway through "Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith," the nearly-corrupted Anakin attends a bizarre zero-gravity water ballet show, sitting next to the clearly villainous Chancellor Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid). Palpatine is secretly a Sith Lord who calls himself Darth Sidious, and he is clearly angling to become an evil emperor, but Anakin doesn't much care. He's so full of hate and paranoia (he's had psychic premonitions that his wife will die in childbirth) that he's willing to give this "Dark Side" thing a try. To illustrate how strong the Dark Side is over the Light, Palpatine gives a speech about a mythic figure called Darth Plagueis the Wise, who was said to be so powerful with the stink of evil that he could protect his loved ones from death.
The scene takes place with both characters seated in an opera box and was filmed with a lot of ominous close-ups. However, according to J.W. Rinzler's 2005 book "The Making of Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith," the "opera box" version of the scene was a last-minute rewrite. It needed to be stripped down.
Cirque du Soleil: Revenge of the Sith
Gavin Bocquet, the film's production designer recalls the first version of the scene which was more active, and required more careful blocking. He also recalled the last-minute decision Lucas made — seemingly out of the blue — to relocate the scene to an opera box overlooking the sci-fi Cirque du Soleil show. To invent the set, Bocquet recalled he had mere hours, saying:
"George suddenly invented an opera scene. [...] So we needed a theater box, and we literally had a day. So we took three of the chairs out of Palpatine's red office and did a quick repaint job, changed the back, and added fabric-all the things we could do in, like, four hours. Even in the world of multimillion-dollar filmmaking — thanks to the early days of dressings, greeblies, and old aircraft parts — George loves the idea that if you stick a few things on and paint them silver with care and attention, they'll look great."
"Greeblies" or "greebles" was a slang term invented by the teams at Industrial Light and Magic back in the 1970s to describe small details and minuscule pieces of set decoration on a "Star Wars" set.
McDiarmid recalls shooting the scene, and the long speech he had to give (well, long compared to the brief blocks of dialogue typically heard in "Star Wars" movies). The actor recalls the theater-like vibe of the shooting, which, he felt, aided his performance. McDiarmid said:
"It was very interesting, the scene we did in the theater. [...] There seemed to be lots of guests on the set that day, which could have been a distraction. On that day, it was a help. I found it was rather like playing to an audience."
A theater veteran should know.
Let's get out of the office
Lucas himself remembered why he decided to shift the scenery from Palpatine's office to a more interesting location: he'd suddenly realized how many scenes of "Revenge of the Sith" take place in office rooms. Indeed, many scenes throughout the "Star Wars" prequel films take place in offices, lobbies, hotel rooms, and other uninteresting interiors. Rather than have yet another discussion over a desk, Lucas felt he could jazz up the visuals a little bit. He said:
"During rehearsal, I said, 'My God, this is a four-page scene-I've had five scenes in this office already ... how am I going to do this?' So I put it in an opera house, watching a ballet — Squid Lake — which worked out great."
Whether or not Lucas wanted "Squid Lake" to be the official, in-script title of the zero-gravity water ballet is unclear — it certainly sounds like a throw-off joke — but it has certainly stuck. "Star Wars" fans can find descriptions of "Squid Lake" on stringently detailed fan websites like Wookieepedia. Evidently, concept artist Ryan Church, when asked to design a futuristic water ballet, looked to the real-life Cirque du Soleil show "O," a water-based show currently running at the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas. Going to Vegas and taking in an expensive show at a fancy hotel was likely not the worst assignment Church could have undergone.