Mark Hamill

Mark Richard Hamill (born September 25, 1951) is an American actor and writer.

Mark Richard Hamill was born on September 25, 1951, in Oakland, California, to Virginia Suzanne (née Johnson) and William Thomas Hamill, a U.S. Navy Captain.

He is one of seven children, with two brothers, Will and Patrick, and four sisters, Terry, Jan, Jeanie, and Kim.

His father has English, Irish, Scottish, and Welsh ancestry and his mother was of half Swedish and half English descent.

Hamill has described his father as a staunch Roman Catholic, and "Nixon Republican".

His father's changes of station and attendant family moves led to the Hamill children switching schools often.

During his elementary years, he attended Walsingham Academy in Williamsburg, Virginia, and Edgar Allan Poe Middle School in Annandale, Virginia.

At age 11, he moved to the 5900 block of Castleton Drive in San Diego, California, where he attended Hale Junior High School.

During his first year at James Madison High School in San Diego, his family moved back to Virginia, and Hamill attended Annandale High School.

By his junior year, his father was stationed in Japan, where Hamill attended and was a member of the Drama Club at Nile C. Kinnick High School, from which he graduated in 1969.

He later enrolled at Los Angeles City College, majoring in drama.

Hamill's early career included a recurring role on the soap opera General Hospital, and a starring role on the short-lived sitcom The Texas Wheelers.

He portrayed the oldest son, David, in the pilot episode of Eight Is Enough, though the role was later performed by Grant Goodeve.

He also had guest appearances on The Bill Cosby Show, The Partridge Family, Room 222 and One Day at a Time.

He appeared in multiple television films such as The City and Sarah T. – Portrait of a Teenage Alcoholic.

Robert Englund was auditioning for a role in Apocalypse Now when he walked across the hall to where auditions were taking place for George Lucas's Star Wars.

After watching the auditions for a while, he realized that Hamill, his friend, would be perfect for the role of Luke Skywalker.

He suggested to Hamill that he audition for the role; as it turned out, Hamill's agent had already set up the audition that gave him the role.

He is best known for his role as Luke Skywalker in the Star Wars franchise, beginning with the original 1977 film and continuing with The Empire Strikes Back (1980), Return of the Jedi (1983), and The Last Jedi (2017).

Released in May 1977, Star Wars was an enormous, unexpected success and had a huge effect on the film industry.

Editions of Joseph Campbell's The Hero with a Thousand Faces (which influenced Lucas as he was developing the films) issued after the release of Star Wars in 1977 used the image of Hamill as Luke Skywalker on the cover.

Hamill has appeared in several documentaries, including The Making of Star Wars and Empire of Dreams: The Story of the Star Wars Trilogy.

His other live-action film and television roles include Kenneth W. Dantley Jr. in Corvette Summer (1978), Private Griff in The Big Red One (1980), Crow in Sushi Girl (2012), Ted Mitchum in Brigsby Bear (2017), and Arthur Pym in the Netflix miniseries The Fall of the House of Usher (2023).

Hamill went on to appear in the less-than-successful Star Wars Holiday Special in 1978, and later starred in the successful film sequels The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi.

During the time between the first two films, Hamill was involved in a serious car accident, fracturing his nose and left cheekbone.

False rumors spread that his face had required plastic surgery.

For his part in both of the sequels, Hamill was honored with the Saturn Award for Best Actor, given by the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Films.

Through the 1980s, Hamill distinguished himself from his role in the original Star Wars trilogy by pursuing a theatre career on Broadway, starring in productions of The Elephant Man, Amadeus and The Nerd.

In 1980, he made a guest appearance on The Muppet Show, both as himself and as Luke Skywalker in the episode The Stars of Star Wars.

The episode also starred C-3PO and R2-D2, who joined Luke on a search for Chewbacca.

Hamill reprised the role of Luke Skywalker for the radio dramatizations of both Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back.

For the Return of the Jedi radio drama, the role was played by a different actor.

He also narrated the 1983 documentary From Star Wars to Jedi: The Making of a Saga.

Hamill has also had a prolific career as a voice actor, best known for voicing the Joker in various DC Comics projects, commencing with Batman: The Animated Series in 1992.

Other voice roles include the Hobgoblin in Spider-Man: The Animated Series (1995–1998), Fire Lord Ozai in Avatar: The Last Airbender (2005–2008), Mr. Salacia and Senator Stampingston in Metalocalypse (2006–2013, 2023), and Skips in Regular Show (2010–2017).

Hamill returned to the Star Wars universe in 2014, when he voiced the ancient Sith Lord Darth Bane in the last episode of season 6 of the animated series The Clone Wars.

He was nominated for a Daytime Emmy Award for his performance.

Following its acquisition of Lucasfilm, The Walt Disney Company released more Star Wars films, starting with The Force Awakens on December 18, 2015.

Initially, both Disney and Hamill were coy about whether Hamill would be a cast member.

It was reported that Hamill had been assigned a nutritionist and personal trainer ahead of production.