The role had been originated by Caroline Blakiston in Star Wars: Return of the Jedi (1983). Genevieve O'Reilly, who played the rebellion leader Mon Mothma in Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith (2005), only to have her footage cut from the film, finally got to appear as that character in Rogue One.

Jimmy Smits, who played the galactic Senator Bail Organa in the Star Wars prequels, returned in that role. General Dodonna, a rebel officer from the original Star Wars, was simply recast: He was played by Alex McCrindle in the first film and Ian McElhinney in the new one. Some vintage Rogue One characters were easier to conjure than others. In his view the character effects are'in the spirit of what a lot of Star Wars has done in the past.' 'A lot of us got into the industry because of Star Wars, and we all have this love of the original source material,' said John Knoll, the chief creative officer at Industrial Light & Magic and a visual-effects supervisor on Rogue One who shares story credit on the film with Gary Whitta. The effects experts and storytellers behind Rogue One, which was directed by Gareth Edwards and written by Chris Weitz and Tony Gilroy, said that they gave careful thought to these issues and were guided by their reverence for this interstellar epic.

In doing so, they also waded into a postmodern debate about the ethics of prolonging the life span of a character and his likeness beyond that of the actor who originated the role.

This nefarious ally of Darth Vader and commander of the Death Star was played by Peter Cushing, the horror-film actor who died in 1994. For the creators of Rogue One, a film designed as a narrative lead-in to the original Star Wars (1977), it was a chance to play with characters, vehicles and locations sacred to this series.īut as they revisited the George Lucas movie that started the Star Wars franchise, and gave fresh screen time to some lesser-known heroes and villains, the staffs of Lucasfilm and Industrial Light & Magic faced artistic and technological hurdles ” most prominently, the need to use a combination of live action and digital effects to bring back the character Grand Moff Tarkin. Making a new Star Wars movie can be like gaining access to a toy collection that has been amassed over four decades.

Rogue one commander peter cushing