Mark Hamill Says Frank Oz Forbid The Cast and Crew From Doing Yoda Impressions on Set

During a recent interview with Wired, Mark Hamill shared an interesting bit of trivia regarding the production of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back. When asked if he could do an impression of Yoda, Hamill shared that he could, but while shooting the movie, Frank Oz forbade the cast and crew from doing Yoda impressions. He explained why:

"When Frank [Oz] was doing Yoda, everybody started doing Yoda. The cameramen, the caterers, wardrobe, stand-ins, stunt doubles. 'Oh, hungry are you? To the commissary you are going? Look, I'm being influenced by your impressions and I want to keep it pure.' So I could see exactly what he was talking about. We all stopped on a dime. And the rest is history."

I don’t blame him for wanting everyone to stop doing Yoda impressions on the set of the film! Oz brought this character to life in such a wonderful way. Oz is the one who actually coined Yoda’s formal yet convoluted syntax, for example, “Smaller in number are we, but larger in mind.” When previously talking about coming up with the way Yoda talks, Oz shared:

“It’s funny you ask about that because I was just looking at the original script of The Empire Strikes Back the other day and there was a bit of that odd syntax in it, but also it had Yoda speaking very colloquially. So I said to George [Lucas]: ‘Can I do the whole thing like this?’ And he said: ‘Sure!’ It just felt so right.”

When asked if he ever gets tired of the endless Yoda imitations that he hears, he said, “No I’m used to it. But people don’t understand, anyone can do a voice. It’s not the voice – it’s the soul.”