A Story from 1983 – Now with pictures!

Snaketibe

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Here's a true story I hope some of you might find interesting…

Part 1

In 1983, I was eleven. Like many eleven year-old British boys in 1983, I was an avid Star Wars fan. I actually regarded myself as very lucky that I had been born when I had, because I considered myself the perfect age for enjoying Star Wars! I had been six when I first saw Star Wars in 1978, and I owned all the Palitoy figures, ships and playsets made for that film; not that I'd got them all at once, you understand. Christmas and birthday money, along with that part of my meagre pocket money which hadn't been eagerly converted into tooth decay at Miss Drewery's Sweet Shop, was scrimped and saved at the Saffron Walden Building Society, which rather conveniently was only a couple of doors along the High Street from the fabulous Ware Toy Shop, which is where George Lucas took receipt of it. For example, I clearly remember withdrawing funds from the Saffron Walden before popping into the Toy Shop and parting with the princely sum of £9.99 and then walking the mile and a half home alone with a Palitoy Death Star clutched in my hot little hands!

By the time The Empire Strikes Back came out in 1980, I was eight and simply couldn't wait to get my hands on all the plastic goodness this fantastic new film would bring my way! I lived, breathed, slept and above all played Star Wars! I still thought myself most fortunate to be of an age where I could enjoy these films and toys, and felt genuinely sorry for those children born too late to have seen Star Wars and Empire; how awful for them that they couldn't enjoy these things as I could! Their lives were significantly disadvantaged by the misfortune of being born too late :) To this day, almost all my most vivid childhood memories revolve around Star Wars, and by that I mostly mean the toys, since the films weren't available on home video (not that my family owned a VCR) and wouldn't début on TV for many years. I loved the films, but had only seen each one twice. I knew them best from reading the Armada Storybooks and Marvel comic adaptations. But the toys! Those I had and could play with and recreate the excitement of the films whenever I wanted, and I certainly did!

Time passed, and in 1982 I saw a trailer for the forthcoming 'Revenge of the Jedi'! To say that this was exciting was a bit like saying ABBA had sold a record or two. Talk about an understatement! How fantastic life was that after Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back we were finally going to have another brand new film! We would at last learn the fate of Han Solo! We would meet Jabba the Hutt! We would see Luke and Leia and Chewie and the droids once again, and I just knew it would be brilliant beyond words! It had already been the almost unimaginably long time of two whole years since Empire had come out, and we still had many months to go, but my goodness! A new film was finally on its way!

So the months dragged by and 1982 eventually became 1983, and it was in the spring of that year that a friend brought a newspaper clipping into school for me. It was a page from the Daily Mirror with a picture of Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia in a scene from the new film! Better yet, there was a competition to enter where, almost unbelievably, you could actually win tickets to see a special preview screening of what was now going to be called 'Return of the Jedi' at The Odeon Marble Arch on Monday 23rd May! How great was that? My avid Star Wars fandom had preceded me to such an extent that my schoolmate had thought of me when he had seen this fabulous competition in the paper, and decided to give the clipping to me so I could enter the competition instead of doing so himself. And enter it I certainly did! The competition required that I answer a painfully easy question or two about Star Wars, which I did in two seconds flat. I then carefully filled in my name and address details onto the return slip, wrote the Daily Mirror's address on an envelope, begged a stamp from my mother, and then made haste to the pillar box to post the precious mail!

I'll be honest with you, as excited as I had been at the prospect of winning tickets when I posted the competition slip, the days naturally went by, eventually turning into weeks as they have a habit of doing, and so it was that on Thursday 19th May 1983, as I got home after school with a friend (also a massive Star Wars fan, naturally), I had completely forgotten about the Daily Mirror competition I had entered. Thus it was with no particular excitement that I greeted the news from my mother that a letter had arrived for me that morning. I didn't get many letters at age eleven, and those I did (other than at Christmas or my birthday) rarely contained anything of great note or interest. I opened the envelope and found this:

01 - Letter copy.jpg


And also a pair of these:

02 - Ticket copy.jpg


As I read the simply astonishing contents aloud, my friend (who was a rather excitable type at the best of times), nearly exploded with amazement and joy at this stroke of unbelievable good fortune that had visited me. I was delighted of course, but also a little in shock, and so as my friend bounced up and down beside me like Tigger saying how happy he was for me, he asked if he could be the friend I took to see it. I replied, 'Yes', which frankly did little to diminish his excitement. Of course at that point, I hadn't even had a chance to think about who I might take with me, and since he was there and asking, I said yes, but what I was more interested in was finding out whether I was going to be able to go at all. I didn't live in London, and so getting to the Odeon Marble Arch for 7:00pm on a Monday evening was by no means a certainty, particularly at such short notice. It was therefore with some trepidation that I showed the letter to my mother, who was of course more than aware of my love of all things Star Wars. My friend was still there enthusing effusively about the virtues of Star Wars and how amazing the new film would be, and did his best to influence my mother by pointing out that we simply had to go and see it. My mother kept me in suspense a little while longer, saying that she would need to discuss it with my friend's mother, but after a short, frantic wait, she confirmed to my joy that yes, we could go! My friend, his mother, my mother and I would travel up to London on the train after school on Monday 23rd May. Our parents would go out to eat somewhere whilst we went to The Odeon to see the film!

The next four days dragged like a snail towing an anvil. Even my secondary school French lessons years later - in which time itself had actually been known to stand still in defiance of the laws of physics - didn't crawl by as slowly as those four days. It was like watching continental drift, only slower. The monotony was broken only by finding myself in the rather embarrassing position of having to explain to the friend who gave me the Daily Mirror clipping in the first place that I wasn't going to be taking him with me. One could of course argue that if he had wanted to see the film he should have entered the competition himself, but that would be unkind and rather unfair. The truth was I could only take one other person, I had already told my other friend that he could go, my mother had already made the arrangements, and most importantly, she also had the final say in any case, so he was out of luck. It was still highly embarrassing though :oops:

Eventually, much like in the beginning of 'Monkey', as endless eons wheeled and passed, at long, long, looooooooong last, the big day finally came! After the lengthiest and most drawn-out day in school history, I ran home, met my friend and impatiently waited for our mothers to get ready. We got in the car, we went to the station, we got on the train and we were off!

I didn't want to know a thing about the new film as I hate spoilers (not that that word had been invented back then), but my ever so eager and dare I say, occasionally rather annoying friend had bought the novelization of the film a few days before and kept trying to tell me what was going to happen in it. Luckily, he hadn't made it more than halfway through the book by that stage, so he couldn't ruin the ending for me and I wouldn't need to remove his tongue or my ears. In any case, I tried changing the subject to one we could both enjoy speculating about; would any of the cast be there? In my mind this was the premier of the film, and stars went to those, so would we meet Mark Hamill? Harrison Ford? Carrie Fisher? We didn't have to wait much longer to find out.

Upon arriving at The Odeon, we showed our Special Preview tickets and were ushered inside and met by a man holding a pile of these magnificent items:

03 - Programme copy.jpg


04 - Programme copy.jpg


05 - Programme copy.jpg
 

Snaketibe

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Part 2

06 - Programme copy.jpg


07 - Programme copy.jpg


I asked the man how much they were, and was delighted to learn that they were free, and he handed one to me! Sadly, there was no sign of Mark Hamill there to greet us, but this was still a good start as we were led through the lobby. One entire side was cordoned off with red ropes, and inside those were several tables crammed full of half-glimpsed probably fabulous items I couldn't properly make out. My friend and I immediately began fresh speculation about what they might be. Were they new figures we hadn't seen yet? Perhaps new and wonderful spaceships, creatures and vehicles from the new film? I didn't know what they were, but I did wish I had more money with me to buy lots of whatever it was they had for sale out there. I also remembered this leaflet:

08 - Booklet copy.jpg


09 - Booklet copy.JPG


10 - Booklet copy.jpg


That kid running out of the theatre with brand spanking new Star Wars toy goodness filling his arms was a pretty powerful image to a Star Wars crazy young boy! I wanted to be that kid, but my shortage of cash made that seem unlikely, I realised with something approaching panic. Perhaps I had enough for a couple of figures?… Time would tell.
 

Snaketibe

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Part 3

We went inside the auditorium and eagerly took our seats, thoughts of new toys rapidly disappearing from my head as the reality of our situation hit home. Here I was, in The Odeon cinema Marble Arch, about to watch Return of the Jedi for the very first time! It's hard to convey just how exciting that feeling was. Star Wars was such a fundamental part of my life that to be there, aged eleven, about to watch my heroes embark upon a brand new adventure that I'd never seen before, was about as close to perfection as things got. If life got any better than this, I didn't see how. Excited chatter buzzed all about us as the cinema filled to the brim with eager people itching to see the new film. The minutes ticked by as 7:30pm approached. I was still holding out hope to see Mark, Harrison and Carrie, and thought this a real possibility as I noticed a microphone standing at the front of the theatre, clearly destined for someone to speak to us! And so it was with an underwhelming sense of disappointment, I'm rather ashamed to admit, that no lesser figure than the late Richard Marquand himself was introduced to the audience by the MC, and took to the stage to speak a few words about the film he had directed. I didn't know who Richard Marquand was and quite frankly cared even less. He wasn't one of the stars, and so all he was doing was delaying the start of the film as far as I was concerned, and so it is with embarrassment that today I cannot recall a single word that the man said.

And then it was time! Marquand had finished droning on about whatever it was he had said, and the lights dimmed! The cinema curtains pulled back! The bubbling chatter died down, and then the simply glorious sound of the Twentieth Century Fox fanfare rang out around the theatre! If there was a happier boy in the world at that moment, I'd be very surprised. But then, panic! I didn't know the films then as I do now, and so when the magical words, 'A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away….' disappeared from the screen to be replaced by the massive legend, 'STAR WARS', 'Oh no, I thought! They're showing the wrong film! This is supposed to be Return of the Jedi, not Star Wars!'... But then the reassuring words, 'Episode VI – RETURN OF THE JEDI' scrolled into view and order was restored to my universe.

The film of course was amazing! I do remember being a touch disappointed that another Death Star was wheeled out right at the start of the film, as they'd already done that in Star Wars, but that was a minor gripe as by the end of the film I was already itching to see it again!

My friend and I couldn't find enough good things to say about it as we filed back out into the lobby, where those red ropes had been removed, bringing our attention immediately back to the goodies laid out on the tables before us like sweets. I politely queued at one table, waiting my turn until I got to the front, only to once again be slightly disappointed that there wasn't a single Star Wars figure to be seen. What there was however was a variety of other merchandise of different shapes and sizes. Due to my financial embarrassment, I hunted for some small items I thought I might be able to afford, and pointed to some pencil toppers. 'How much are these, please?' I politely enquired of the uniformed Odeon staff member standing behind the table. 'They're free,' came the astonishing reply! That said, I didn't want to be greedy, so I took only a few of the pencil toppers, and hoped I wouldn't be told I was taking too many! My friend by contrast didn't need telling twice and had no compunction about taking far more than me, and nobody seemed inclined to stop him! Perhaps this should have encouraged me to go back for more, as he made out like a bandit, but I didn't think I should go back to the table again for second helpings, and so my freebie haul for the night ended up being rather small! I do however still have those pencil toppers:

11 - Freebies copy.jpg


12 - Freebies copy.jpg


13 - Freebies copy.jpg


And there you have it. That's the story of how I went to see Return of the Jedi in 1983. When I got back to school the next day another Star Wars mad friend of mine demanded that I recall every single detail I could about the film. I was sorry I couldn't have taken him, but I only had two tickets (and I wish I still did; the friend I did take asked to keep his, and I said yes, which is why I can only show you one of them here). And so I did as he asked and recounted the entire film to the best of my memory, as he drank in every last thrilling detail. Of course less than two weeks later I went round his house to find him watching the damn thing on pirate video, which took a little of the sting out of not being able to bring him with me to The Odeon!

I've always liked Return of the Jedi. It might not be the equal of Star Wars or Empire, but for me it's still a terrific entry in the series, and although I might not love them, I don't even hate the ewoks :) And so, even though as an increasingly cynical, slightly jaded, but fundamentally decent middle-aged man all these years later, nothing can quite tarnish the special memory of winning that competition and seeing the film for the very first time. And for those hardy souls that have stuck with this tale to the very end, thanks for letting me share those memories with you.
 

skywalker

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BRAVO... Fantastic story I really enjoyed it.

What a great memory to have, I love ROTJ and can only imagine at 11 what it must have been like to win that competition and get to see an advanced screening of the movie.. SO LUCKY.!

How about that friend is he someone you are still in contact with..?

Thanks for sharing your memories dude. :D :D
 

Joe

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Fantastic thread, really enjoyable read! Thanks so much for sharing it on here, that's easily one of the most amazing and vivid recollections of a Star Wars experience I've ever had the pleasure of reading.
 

jedisearcher

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So you were abit excited then? :lol:

Brilliant story, 3 things stick out.

1. Reading the books and comics because there was simply no way to get a SW fix in those days.
2. I was always so jealous of the boy in the advert. Lucky git :lol:
3. Curtains in the cinema! It'll always be something kids of today just won't experience ...

Thanks for sharing :D
 

bosk70

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Amazing story, really takes me back, what else was on the table ??, we had a pirate copy of Jedi bought off the video man, do you remember them, turn up on the door with a large open up wooden box to rent or buy video's , naughty ones hidden in the top corner :lol: played the Jedi until it was worn out :D
 

roundster

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awesome story!

I worked with a guy who had his own star wars claim to fame.

He said he'd been on Jim'll fix it and been to the studios or something. We all assumed it was bull **** until he came in with his Jim'll fix it medal which had the ESB logo on the back.

Pretty sure this is it https://youtu.be/J_VwEStIKj8

Shame he probably doesn't want to talk about it any more!!
 

Snaketibe

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Thanks for all the kind comments. In answer to a few of the questions this has generated, I actually moved from Hertfordshire to a different part of the country later that summer, and although I kept in touch with some of my old primary school mates for a short while, children generally don't seem that great at keeping in touch, and unfortunately I have long since lost contact with all those old school friends mentioned in this story :-(

As for what else was on the table? I'm afraid I can't completely recall after all these years, but I do know there were more pencil topper characters than just the five I took away, as my friend grabbed several other characters that I didn't get. I do remember part of the reason I chose the toppers, apart from the fact that I hoped they were cheap, was because they were the closest things they had to figures there. As for the other freebies, I'm afraid it would be half guesswork after all this time. I do know there were many different things to be had, but the only other things I'm pretty sure about were some pencils (which would make sense, given the toppers). In fact, I think the multi-coloured pencil I have posted a picture of in this thread (http://starwarsforum.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=29936) came from the Odeon, but whilst my memory is pretty good, I'm afraid it isn't perfect, so I didn't include the photo here as I wasn't completely sure and I have tried to keep this account faithful.
 

chipsteak

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Thanks for sharing. I love hearing memories of the era.

That drawing competition reminds me. in a job lot, I acquired a printed list of winners for it from Palitoy. From back when they offered such a thing if you gave them an SAE. Sadly, my name was never on any of these things. If anyone even one as much as a runner-up prize, they're immortalized on this.
 
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