Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1542650
S A G A F T R A .O R G S AG - A F T R A S PEC I A L IS S U E 2 0 26 74 human connection that informs his acting. A month aer Star Wars had its initial release in 1977, Ford told The New York Times he couldn't imagine what the "sci-fi stuff" in the film would look like from just reading the script. He decided then to depend on what he knew something about: human relationships. Already married with two sons by the time he became an international sensation for his portrayal of rogue starship pilot Han Solo, Ford was 34 when the space fantasy had its first release in a limited number of theaters. By then, he'd already contributed to a decade's worth of roles which ranged from an uncredited bellboy in his screen debut Dead Heat on a Merry-Go-Round (1966) to a cowboy hat-wearing street racer in George Lucas' second feature film, American Graffiti (1973). Though Ford had a contract with Columbia and then Universal when he first moved to California in the early 1960s, he was released from both in under two years. The head of the new talent program at Columbia wanted him to change his name and get his hair cut like Elvis Presley. Ford told Variety in a 2025 interview he "didn't go along with [that]."