Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1542650
75 S AG - A F T R A S PEC I A L IS S U E 2 0 26 S A G A F T R A .O R G Years later, the executive, who had once told Ford that he "had no future in the business," sent him a card saying, "I missed my guess." Nailing His Role Being dropped from a seven-year contract aer only a year might have demoralized some, but Ford made ends meet by working as a carpenter, a trade he learned from books checked out of the Encino Public Library in California. Continuing to audition, the money from this self-taught vocation enabled him to only accept parts which, according to a 1982 Entertainment Tonight interview, "were better than what [he] had been offered before, and in good movies." There's a frequently shared legend that Ford was doing carpentry on film sets when he was asked to help out with Star Wars casting by reading lines for the auditioning Princess Leias — that he was a college dropout who lucked into movie stardom. The truth is more nuanced and speaks to Ford's commitment to making great work, whether it's balustrades or blockbusters. As a favor for a designer friend, Ford agreed to install the millwork on Francis Ford Coppola's offices, but on the condition that he would do it "only at night, when no one was around." In a 2023 Esquire interview, Ford said he wanted to make sure filmmakers only knew him as an actor. He didn't want to be "that guy." The next morning, George Lucas, who was in the initial stages of casting Star Wars, strolled in while Ford was cleaning