So I hung out with Darth Vader. For over three hours. He called me “his little friend”. I bought him a shandy, an actual shandy. He’s British. I think it’s a thing there. So yeah, not to be confused with the VOICE of Darth Vader, the great James Earl Jones, I am talking about the former Mr. Universe, Dave Prowse. The ACTUAL Darth Vader.

Drinking A Shandy

My sister and I were celeb stalking people watching during Dragoncon. We were sitting at one of the Marquee lounges when suddenly my sister elbowed me and did the eye nod. Let me just state for the record that I am terrible at silent communication. I also have terrible hearing and I can’t read lips. Basically, I would be the LAST person to take on a top secret mission or stakeout. Since subtlety is not my strong suit, I turned to her and said “what?”, probably fairly loudly based off her reaction and the fact that I’m hard of hearing. When I finally understood what she was getting at, I turned and saw Darth Vader standing five feet from us. He was chatting it up with various people and then he looked our way. I’m also really bad at looking away, particularly with famous people. He caught me staring, my sister hit me, but it was too late, I was transfixed. It was like he had some mind controlling power over me and I couldn’t help but being drawn in. hee hee. He motioned for us to come over and without a second thought, we did.

Next thing I know, he’s telling me about his daughter’s wedding and his thoughts on Spielberg and Lucas. I was totally enthralled. At least the parts I could hear. Did I mention I have a hearing issue? So for the next three hours we talked, well, Darth Vader talked. I executed the typical social cues of a smile here and a laugh there, tossing in an excited “really?” or “oh my gosh!” while adding in the appropriate amount of social shoulder touching because I could hardly hear a thing. He was right next to me and between his accent, his old man voice and my terrible ears, I basically caught just over a sentence an hour. So yes, I was totally faking it with Darth Vader, BUT, it was still completely and utterly one of the coolest experiences of my life! And I bought him a shandy.

What did I learn from it all? When famous old men call you over, introduce you as their “little friend” and let you buy them a shandy – roll with it, folks. Even if you have to fake it to make it happen.

David Prowse, my sister Steph, and Me
Dragoncon 2008