‘Luke, I am your fencer’ may not have had the same iconic effect on Star Wars fans as the original line but that doesn’t mean it’s not true.
Former Olympian Bob Anderson once claimed the sword chose him – and if that sounds like a movie quote, you shouldn’t be surprised…
The legendary fencer, who passed away at 89 in 2012, was Hollywood’s most sought-after sword masters during his career.
Anderson’s work can be seen in James Bond flicks, The Legend of Zorro, The Lord of the Rings trilogy, two of the original three Star Wars films and even The Parent Trap.
However, his legacy isn’t as credited as it should be, with his crowning achievements coming from behind a mask – fencing and being Darth Vader.
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Great Britain have a dismal record in Anderson’s sport, despite it being one of only four events featured in every modern Olympics.
Team GB have only won nine fencing medals at the Games in its history, including one solitary gold, with no representative in Paris.
Anderson was a key figure in the country’s only golden generation in fencing, but never earned an Olympic medal himself.
He served in the Royal Marines during World War II, and despite being on board the HMS Coventry when it was sunk, his stock as a foilist was only rising.
Anderson claimed military fencing titles in all three of the sport’s categories – foil, epee and sabre – before eyeing up the Olympics.
Two years after becoming a two-time gold medalist at the 1950 British Empire Games, Anderson helped Team GB finish joint fifth in the sabre in Helsinki.
The future film fight choreographer later doubled as Britain’s national coach, overseeing six consecutive Olympics, including silver-medal-winning appearances at Rome 1960, and Tokyo four years later.
It was the year of his only Olympics as a competitor that he got the call from Hollywood that would change the course of film history.
Anderson told Fencing Online: “I was working in London in 1952, but I was waiting to go to Helsinki. I had 10 days free and I got a phone call from Elstree Studios.
“They were making a film called Master of Ballantrae with Errol Flynn and an actor called Tony Steel. They wanted three fencing experts to do a big fight and I had 10 days so I went along and met Errol Flynn.”
Anderson was invited back after the Olympics to continue choreographing the film’s fights, in which he developed the ‘dance sequence’ of riposte and counter-ripostes that became synonymous of all future swashbuckling roles.
After a rehearsal went wrong he became notorious as ‘the man who stabbed Errol Flynn’, despite the Australian-American taking responsibility for his slashed thigh.
Anderson eventually made his way to the Star Wars franchise, when the body of Darth Vader needed a different British Olympic hopeful to the one that was already in use.
David Prowse, who unsuccessfully tried to represent GB’s weightlifting team in the 1964 Olympics, is well-known as the man inside the iconic Vader costume, which was voiced by James Earl Jones.
That’s only exclusively true of Star Wars, A New Hope, with Anderson drafted in for both Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi.
He explained: “I’m six-foot-one, but Darth Vader (Prowse) is six-foot-five, so I had to wear lifts and had my uniform built up so eventually there was not a lot of difference.
“He, (Prowse) got the job because he was supposed to be able to fence, but he couldn’t, I worked with him for a long time but we weren’t able to make him good enough for the part.
“I doubled for him, and [stunt co-ordinator] Peter [Diamond] and I worked out the fight sequences. What you see is Mark Hamill and myself. Mark is very good, I trained him.
“[Stuntman Colin Skeaping] didn’t double Mark for the sword fight because Mark developed into a better swordsman than Colin. Mark and I did the sequence from start to finish.”
That compliment may have been the reason American icon Hamill was so keen to publicise Anderson’s work after Prowse got the credit.
It was Anderson who severed the right hand of Luke Skywalker, and is the figure wearing Vader’s black helmet and cloak when Earl Jones’ voice says – “I am your father.”
Having told Star Wars director George Lucas that it was unfair to keep Anderson’s contribution secret, Hamill said in a 1983 interview: “Bob Anderson was the man who actually did Vader’s fighting.
“Bob worked so bloody hard that he deserves some recognition. It’s ridiculous to preserve the myth that it’s all done by one man.”
For the next thirty years, Anderson trained a young Lindsay Lohan, became Sean Connery’s double, perfected the swordsmanship on Pirates of the Carribean, and developed Zorro’s rapier skills.
“We used to call him Grumpy Bob on the set, he was such a perfectionist,” Martin Campbell, ‘The Mask of Zorro’ director told the New York Times in 2001.
“He was incredibly inventive and also refused to treat any of the actors as stars. They would complain about the intensity of the training, but having worked with him there’s nobody I’d rather use.”
His daughter, Simone Froud later told the Sussex Express: “He was an expert. That’s why people like Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, Richard Gere, and Antonio Banderas wanted him to teach them.
“All actors wanted to do their own sword work, so they would train with him for six months to get it right.”
Following Anderson’s passing, former fencing academy president Philip Bruce said he was ‘truly one of our greatest fencing masters’.
“The sword is the ultimate weapon,” Anderson once explained to the Los Angeles Times 29 years ago.
“It’s not so threatening shooting at someone 20 or 30 paces away or while hiding behind things. When you get into a sword fight, you’re standing toe-to-toe with someone who’s trying to kill you and you’re looking him in the eye — now that’s thrilling.”
The man who was instrumental in the making of your favourite films has a strong case to have his life and career become one of its own.
Now the big-screen telling of that story would be thrilling…
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News Summary:
- I’m Team GB’s ‘greatest fencing master’ who played Darth Vader before training Zorro, Legolas… and Lindsay Lohan
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