Filmmakers Trailer Festival

 Home: George Lucas - Star Wars

FilmMakers Magazine logo

Sponsors

Greenlight Script Coverage

Greenlight Script Coverage
Filmmaking community, film School, Hollywood filmmaker and Film Trailers

American Gem Short Script and Literary Festival

 

LIFE STORY

 

George Lucas - Star Wars
George Lucas - Star Wars
Producer| Director | Screenwriter

Comprehensive George Lucas, Star Wars site, Biography, movies, awards, news, and resource links.

Biography:

George Walton Lucas Jr. was born on May 14,1944 in Modesto, California... After surviving a near fatal auto accident George Lucas immediately enrolled in a local junior college in a successful attempt to bring his grades up high enough to be accepted in the University of Southern California’s film program. He interpreted “film” to mean “photography,” but once he began his work in motion pictures he knew it was what he loved... George Lucas never dreamed his creation would one day become a box office phenomena.  By 2015 the Star Wars Movie franchise grossed over 6 billion dollars worldwide.

see George Lucas full bio and trivia and more

Date of Birth: May 14th, 1944
Sign: Taurus
Place of Birth: Modesto, California, USA
Education: University of Southern California, in film
Business Information: Lucasfilm Ltd.
P.O. Box 2009
San Rafael, CA 94912, USA

Phone: 415-662-1800
Type: Motion Pictures
Web Address: http://www.lucasfilm.com 
Personal quote: "It's hard work making movies. It's like being a doctor: you work long hours, very hard hours, and it's emotional, tense  work. If you don't really love it, then it ain't worth it." 

George Lucas  - Star Wars Photo

George Walton Lucas Jr. was born on May 14,1944 in Modesto, California. He spent his childhood fascinated with comic books, especially “Buck Rogers” and “Flash Gordon.” He spent his teenage years bored with the tedium of routine school days and teachers. Car racing was the only excitement that George Lucas was allowed.   

It was his love of car racing that would dramatically change his life. June 12, 1962, three days before George Lucas was to graduate from high school, he was involved in a serious accident. George Lucas was gravely injured when his Fiat Biancina was struck broadside by another car (a fellow student at Downey High School, Modesto California) and was sent rolling toward a walnut tree at sixty miles per hour.

His seat belt snapped and he was flung from the car which, a split second later, collided with such force that it moved the tree two feet, roots and all. If the seat belt had worked, he would have been killed instantly. “You can’t have that kind of experience and not feel that there must be a reason why you’re here,” George Lucas has said. “I realized I should be spending my time trying to figure out what that reason is and trying to fulfill it.”  

He immediately enrolled in a local junior college in a successful attempt to bring his grades up high enough to be accepted in the University of Southern California’s film school. He interpreted “film” to mean “photography,” but once he began his work in motion pictures he knew it was what he loved. He became determined to succeed in this competitive environment. George Lucas differed greatly from much of the rest of the ‘60s film school generation that his love affair with movies began only after he entered college. “I only went to movies to chase girls,” George Lucas commented of his youth in Modesto. “It took years before good movies got to my town – and foreign films? Never.”   

George Lucas’ student work reflected the pop culture obsessions of his youth: 1:42:08, a racing mini-epic, and The Emperor, about a disc jockey named Emperor Hudson, were signature student works, which George Lucas would later revisit and build upon in American Graffiti.

In 1966, George Lucas was hired as a teaching assistant

After graduating from USC in 1966, George Lucas was hired as a teaching assistant assigned to train cameramen for the U.S. Military. It was during this time that George Lucas found an opportunity to shoot THX 1138:4EB – an abstract, Orwellian science fiction short which went on to win several major student awards and which would ultimately be adapted to the big screen for George Lucas’ first studio feature. In 1967, George Lucas re-enrolled as a USC graduate student. In the same year, he was selected as one of four student filmmakers from the USC and UCLA film programs to make a “behind the scenes” documentary about the making of McKenna’s Gold. On the strength of his many student awards, George Lucas won USC’s annual scholarship to become a production apprentice at Warner Brothers.

George Lucas might be driven by grand ambitions, he was financially cautious

Along with his high school car accident and the decision to attend USC; the apprenticeship turned out to be another life-altering event. Warner Bros. was in turmoil thanks to its recent purchase by Seven Arts and the resulting exodus of founding production chief Jack Warner. There was only one film in production on the entire lot: a musical starring Fred Astair and Petula Clark entitled Finian’s Rainbow, which was being directed by a 27-year-old UCLA graduate,

Francis Coppola. It was due to this that the two met and became life long friends despite their opposite personalities. George Lucas was physically slight, Coppola was large and flamboyant; while George Lucas might be driven by grand ambitions, he was financially cautious while Coppola was reckless with money; where George Lucas was quiet and reserved, Coppola reveled in the spotlight.

During his apprenticeship, Coppola made George Lucas an offer he couldn’t refuse

During his apprenticeship, Coppola made George Lucas an offer he couldn’t refuse. George Lucas would become a paid assistant on both Finian’s Rainbow and The Rain People, the artier road movie that Coppola was prepping on the side, and Coppola would help nurture George Lucas’ newest baby, a feature length version of THX. When Finian’s Rainbow wrapped, Coppola made good on his promise and talked Warner Bros. into signing George Lucas to develop his THX feature. George Lucas continued to work on both The Rain People with Coppola during the day and work on THX by night.    

In 1969, when The Rain People was completed, Coppola decided to move on to the next phase of his plan to take over the film industry. He went on a celebrated equipment-buying spree during his trip to Europe, which, by some accounts, left the more conservative George Lucas terrified. Once back in the U.S., Coppola and George Lucas conceived a plan to rent a warehouse in San Francisco, CA and turn it into an independent studio called American Zoetrope, after one of the earliest motion picture devices.

next page

 

*The FilmMakers Film Fund will finance the production of all future film projects. The projects will be made up of undiscovered Emerging artists in film including: screenwriters, directors, producers, actors, cinematographers, music composers, first assistant directors (AD), art directors, costume designers, production managers (PM), etc.

Support our Youth by making a donation to the FilmMakers Film Fund.

BY CREDIT CARD CLICK ON THE BUTTON

THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT!

next page

 

top of page

Important disclaimer

Article Title:  George Lucas - Star Wars

Tags: George Lucas, George Lucas bio, Star Wars, George Lucas biography, Lucas, biography, filmography, george lucas resources, george lucas awards, George Lucas movies, george lucas films, news, films in development, films in post, lucas photos, film director, screenwriter, producer, filmmaker. links to George Lucas films, news, George Lucas Star Wars, movie Star Wars, lucas filmmaker, lucas director


 

George Lucas Filmmakers

Submit Literary Material | View Literary Material | Database
 
Submit Screenwriting Contest |
View Screenwriting Contests
Screenwriter Actor  | Contact Us | Advertise With Us

Copyright © 1999-2016 by FilmMakers.com. All rights reserved.
FilmMakers.com is a division of Media Pro Tech Inc.