46

Towards the end of The Rise of Skywalker, in the final confrontation scene between

Rey and Palpatine

Rey hears the voices of many previous Jedi. This question tells us that Alec Guinness is credited with one of the lines but he died in 2000, well before the character of Rey was developed.

If he'd said "Use the Force" or something similar, or the character had been part of the original trilogy (and so they'd had unused lines they could reuse) then I'd understand but short of some techno-jedi I'm confused.

How did Sir Alec Guinness have a credited speaking role in a film more than 19 years after his death?

Improve this question
2
  • 2
    +1. I don’t think it says in the linked question. Which words were said in the voice of Alec Guinness (as opposed to Ewen McGregor)?
    – Darren
    Commented Jan 3, 2020 at 18:03
  • Nevermind, just watched the vid below with Jimmy Kimmel.
    – Darren
    Commented Jan 3, 2020 at 18:05

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
83

McGregor: But they used, they got Alec Guinness to do "Rey." Which is extraordinary because he's not alive anymore.

Kimmel: JJ's really impressive. Yeah.

McGregor: Amazing what they can do these days. But! They found a, they got a line of him as Alec...Obi-Wan Kenobi saying "afraid" and they just cut the "a" and the "d" off and they got that "Rey" and then they used that. So Alec Guinness is saying "Rey" and then I say "these are your first steps."

Improve this answer
6
  • 12
    As a side note: even if they did not have that part of audio, today it is possible to clone voices with relatively little effort: towardsdatascience.com/… . I wonder if the splicing was done for legal (copyright) reasons.
    – Sredni Vashtar
    Commented Jan 5, 2020 at 13:31
  • 9
    @SredniVashtar: It's an old, tried, simple, and workable method - the hardest part is finding source material. For a single syllable, this is relatively easy.
    – Piskvor left the building
    Commented Jan 6, 2020 at 9:55
  • 3
    It's a good thing her name is just one common syllable. They'd probably have a harder time getting him to say e.g. "Kylo", (although if they had to do that, they'd probably just use "Ben")
    – Darrel Hoffman
    Commented Jan 6, 2020 at 15:31
  • 9
    Plot twist: Rey was named that because that was one of they syllables they had Alec Guiness saying
    – Wayne Werner
    Commented Jan 6, 2020 at 15:53
  • 2
    @DarrelHoffman, not that hard. "Obi-Wan Kenobi. Obi-Wan... Now, that's a name I've not heard in a long time. A long time." You've got all the required phonemes in that one line of dialogue to splice the name "Kylo".
    – Keith Morrison
    Commented Jan 6, 2020 at 23:07
28

Voice splicing.

They take lines he had in the original trilogy and take out specific words and syllables to make him say what they want. For example in The Force Awakens you can hear his voice say 'Rey' during her vision, this was taken from the word 'afraid' which has that syllable in it, he said this word in A New Hope.

Improve this answer
2
  • 28
    "Hello there! Come here my little friend. Don’t be afraid."
    – DavidW
    Commented Jan 3, 2020 at 17:20
  • 1
    Reminds me of when EA claimed Marlon Brando was doing voice work for The Godfather video game. They played a few samples from the movie to justify this weak claim and used a soundalike for everything else.
    – locka
    Commented Jan 6, 2020 at 16:38

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge you have read our privacy policy.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.