The Force of the Jedi Collector Pt. II
By Robert Covarrubias
Last week we got a glimpse into the world of Gus Lopez our Star Wars Heavy Hitter of the month. We did an interview so big that it had to be split into two parts. My first thought was to cut it down but as I transcribed the interview I thought, This is definitely an interview people will get a lot out of, I know I did. I hope you readers enjoy the interview and the information that was graciously shared with EternalCollector.com
The History Pt. II
1994 -- Front page of Daily Variety announced that: "Lucas The Loner Returns To Wars." Lucas tells Rex Weiner of Variety that work will soon begin on the long-awaited Prequel Trilogy. The first prequel is tentatively scheduled for a 1998 release. Lucas states that the recent advances in computer generated imaging ( CGI) as seen in Jurassic Park and Casper make the filming of the new trilogy both inexpensive and technically possible. Also, Lucas states that he will direct Episode 1. This is the first time that Lucas has directed a film since the original Star Wars. The new CG technology will create a new way to make films where a writer's imagination can be fully released without restrictions. With the level of computer animation technology available, Lucas believes that he is now free to write more interesting and complex Star Wars scripts.
1995 -- Lucas is hard at work on writing the screenplay for Episode 1 . . . The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles helps pave the way for the Prequel Trilogy. ILM develops the technology and means to create virtual environments for this landmark television series. ILM packs each hour long episode with hundreds of special effects sequences at very reasonable prices. With the new digital effects techniques developed for Young Indy, Lucas believes that he will be able to make the Prequel Trilogy very economically: about $ 60 - 70 million per film.
May 1996 -- Lucasfilm announces that it has signed a deal (reportedly worth $ 2 billion) with Pepsico (Pepsi, Pizza Hut, KFC, Taco Bell and Frito Lay) for movie tie-ins related to the new Prequel Trilogy. Variety called this "the largest in size and scope the entertainment industry has ever seen."
Late 1996 -- Lucasfilm announces that pre-production on Episode 1 has begun.
September 1996 -- Lucasfilm announces that Leavesdon Studios in Britain will be used to film portions of Episode 1.
Late 1996 -- ILM celebrates its twentieth anniversary.
November 1996 -- Lucasfilm announces that ILM is developing revolutionary computer software that will be used to create the 2000-plus effects sequences that will be seen in Episode 1.
1997 -- Fans learn that Ewan McGregor will play the role of the younger Obi-Wan Kenobi and Liam Neeson will play the role of a venerable Jedi Knight. Natalie Portman won the pivotal role of the young Queen while Samuel L. Jackson will appear as a Jedi Master in Episode 1.
June 1997 -- Principle photography for Episode 1 begins. Lucasfilm's unique style of ultra secrecy is utilized on the set. Despite this security, the plot line of the film is leaked bit by bit to the Internet. By the end of 1998, SuperShadow.com has posted an accurate summary of the Episode 1 script. Thus, SS.com becomes the center of Star Wars fandom on the Internet.
September 6, 1997 -- The first phase of principle photography for Episode 1 ends.
April 1998 -- Lucasfilm announces that 20th Century Fox has won the rights to release the Prequel Trilogy. Fox is rumored to receive only a small distribution fee and will not share in the box-office gross. Fox had lost the right to future Star Wars films when Rupert Murdoch bought the studio in the mid-1980's. Fox' contract with Lucas had a "key man" clause that terminated their rights to future Star Wars films if the studio were acquired by new owners.
While some believe that in 100 years Star Wars will be a religion, the humble Lucas states that one day Star Wars "will be nothing more than a pretty minor footnote in the pop culture of the 1970s and 1980s."
starwars.com announces that Episode 1 will be released in North America on Friday, May 21, 1999.
For the complete chronological history visitwww.supershadow.com
The Interview Pt. II
What is the rarest item that you own?
As I said I have a lot of one of a kind items, I have in many cases things that for example for Star Wars they had these series of toys called the micro collection where they made these small play sets and plastic with metal figures and they made a few play sets and they cancelled the line because it wasn’t as successful as the small action figures so they made some prototypes for the next wave of those play sets and I have four different ones. But for each one they made one or two examples of so they’re pretty rare like the Death Star model from the first film it’s the full 3D model so that’s one of as kind all the stuff is extremely rare because there’s only one example of it.
Is your Collection insured?
Yeah, I get special collectors insurance that you can get policies specifically designed for Collecting but in some sense insurance…when you collect the kind of stuff I try to get, worse case scenario they’ll at least compensate for some of it but you’ll never get back the kinds of things you got.
What is your Holy Grail? Anything you have yet to acquire that you really want?
Yeah, those few things I’m looking for they’re always things I’m still reaching to get, I’m looking to find this R2D2 thermos like lunch box thing that they made prototypes of that I’m interested in finding, some cereal boxes from Australia from Return of the Jedi that I’m trying to get, there’s a parka that they made for filming Empire Strikes Back in Norway so when they were doing the filming in the glaciers they had this blue cast and crew jacket that they made so I’ve been trying to track one of those down. So those are examples of things I know are out there and I’m trying to find them.
As a collector you seem very well informed about the existence of a lot of these items, where do you get your information?
Just through networking, every collector has different strategies for how they find stuff, some will throw money at it some will shop on eBay; different people will have different approaches. Mine from the very beginning has always been like to overwhelm myself with information to find out what’s out there, what did they make, who has what, get details, talk to people who worked on the thing. I have found that generally the Collectors who have the most information independent of everything else, the amount of money they have to spend, their luck at finding things, whatever, people with the most information tend to find the best pieces because they know what the prices are, they know what’s available, they make very educated decisions they have a lot of options in terms of different opportunities to find things so that’s always been my angle, get as much information as you can and then the opportunities come out of that so that’s just kind of how I always approached it. Learn as much as you can about it. And I actually found when I started there was very little information like a lot of the things I have are things that 10 years ago no one even knew about it, it’s just a matter of doing primary research on it.
With the size of your collection you could probably charge admission, Have you ever had people come over and see your collection for the first time?
Yeah, I do have people come over once in a while; sometimes people I know come over. I actually have a few pieces on display in a museum there’s a local museum in Seattle that borrowed a few things. I haven’t really thought of doing a museum I’m not sure that a Star Wars museum would actually… even though star wars is popular I’m not sure it would have enough interest to the general public to have a steady stream of people all the time so I haven’t been interested in doing that, but I think if they ever did do a Star Wars museum somewhere I wouldn’t mind lending them some stuff to show there.
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Cast members yearbooks
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New prototypes |
What is the usual reaction of people looking at your collection for the first time?
Well, it depends different people react different ways. People who know I collect they come over and usually have no idea of the scale of my Collection; they come in and go “Oh my God!” It’s like 100 times what they thought it would be, the whole house is decorated. Then there’s a very common reaction. You’ll get couples who come by and one of them collects Star Wars and drags like the wife along to see the house and then you see the husband turn to the wife “See I’m not this bad” because it will be on a level that the spouse would be man I thought it was bad in my house…there’s that kind of reaction. The strongest reaction I get is actually from very experienced Collectors, people who are really into Collecting. When they come over they are really hit because a lot of the stuff I’ve focused on are really esoteric, really trying to find novel things unusual things and so I also have a lot of stuff I’ve never put on the website that I don’t document. The more someone knows about Collecting the more they have an impact when they come over.
Do attend conventions?
Yeah, all the time I speak at conventions and attend them and all that.
Which one is your favorite?
I like going to the ones overseas when they have them. Like in the past year in a half I went to conventions in Germany, The Netherlands, two different ones in Mexico, Spain, so I like the ones in other countries because you can shop for things that are just pretty unusual. I think my favorite conventions are probably the ones in Mexico they have a regular convention there it has the greatest combination of everything like they have really good guests they treat the guests well, the dealer rooms are awesome people are really nice I think I have the most fun at those conventions I usually end up staying a week.
Tell me about the Star Wars collecting club you started.
About 11 years I started a local group in Seattle called SARLACC which is an acronym that stands for Seattle ARea Lucasfilm Artifacts Collecting Club. I kept running into all these local Collectors in Seattle that I would always see at the shows, you get to be friends with them. Then I started thinking, you know we should just get people together every month go to someone’s house, have a party every month and so we started doing that and then it got very successful. Star Wars was booming in the 90s so it was not hard to find people that wanted to do this, so it continued every month. It really started like January of 94 so it’s been about 11years, in fact the club was so successful that we don’t even have to advertise it or anything the club was pretty low key just by word of mouth people would find out about it. Since then a lot of clubs in other parts of the country started like I told some friends of mine in other parts of the country, hey you guys might just want to do this, and then they all just kind of started. People have done this all over the country and each club is a different character and style. Some of them are huge because they do a lot of advertising and outreach to find people and generally SARLACC has been kind of more informal, the idea has mostly been like people who are really into it will eventually connect with us and gravitate towards it, but not a lot of effort on trying to get lots of people or any big structure around it so each club has a different style to it.
Here’s a what if question, If there were a fire and you only had time to save one item which one would it be and why?
Oh man, that would be bleak…I don’t know that’s a good question… I don’t know its hard to say I mean the problem is there would be so many things that would be a loss to the world if that happened because there’s just only one example, thing s like the original Death Star model would be something that would be impossible to get it out in a hurry cause it’s in a case that’s bigger than the front door but anyway that kind of thing I think would be just for historical purpose something that would be a huge loss if that would ever happen.
Would you ever sell your collection?
I’m not planning to, I’ve no intention to but you never know. I do sell things once in a while if its something I’m tired of or I’m trying to save for something else, occasionally I’ll let a few things go but generally anything that I really love that’s one of a kind or something really unusual I never let go of it.
Is there anything you’re looking forward to getting in the New Year?
Since this will be the last Star Wars film and I collect the cereal boxes, this will be the last round of Star Wars, movie related cereal boxes so I’m looking forward to getting my network going again in all the countries to get the cereal from all over the world, when episode II came out I got over 600 boxes from 15 different countries, its kind of a challenge but it’s exciting cause I love the cereal boxes so I’m excited for the episode III box to come out.
Since this is the last Star Wars film are there any special events planned?
Yeah, there are going to be quite a few conventions, there’s one in Germany, one in France, two in Mexico one in the united states, the big one called Celebration III in Indianapolis in April so there are going to be a lot of conventions in the next year. This will be the last time a Star Wars film comes out so I think it will be a pretty big deal. But in a way I’m kind of looking forward to them being done with the films because it will allow collecting to taper off to being just the community people that are in it for the long haul. In the 90’s it got out of control, I mean its great that it’s popular but there wasn’t enough longevity to much of the collecting and I think that will come back after episode III so I’m kind of looking forward to that.
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C3po collectors case prototypes
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Are you involved in creating any of these events?
I help speak at them and with Lucas films I’m helping them with the collecting track, with the organizing of it for Celebration III, so I definitely help with all these conventions.
What will happen to your Collection when you are gone?
Ah…I’ll take it with me…who knows if there’s ever a museum or something that would be great, at this time it’s hard to say.
Any tips or advice for new Collectors?
Well, I think the two best tips are and we touched on this which is learn as much as you can about all of the stuff and that I believe is the most important thing in collecting, to learn whatever you can, having information, networking, contact, all that stuff is more important than anything else in collecting. The second thing I would say is to…its cliché to say this but collect what you like. So many collectors follow the crowd and look at what everybody else is collecting and what’s cool to collect and certainly its good and a positive influence and I too get influenced by what other people collect and it helps as far as what I want to collect but people really need to pick with what they like collecting even if it’s a little out of step with what most other collectors are after because I think that’s what makes collecting interesting. When people have their own taste applied to it, it’s unique. When I go visit a Collector’s Collection if they just buy the same old action figure that everybody else is buying I find it generally boring cause its like great the same kind of thing everybody else is collecting it’s great for them they love it but I don’t think its that interesting, but when people collect unique things its really interesting. I know a local collector in Seattle who collects everything for his bathroom, he has a Star Wars bathroom so he has the shampoo, the tooth brush holder, the tooth brushes, the toothpaste, the after shave, towels, everything that is just so cool like to just focus on the Star Wars bathroom its just a different angle, some people will collect a particular character, some will collect a particular toy line that they did. Things like that, each unique style brings something to collecting and not a lot of collectors do that and I think that’s very important cause people look at my stuff an go, “oh man this is so cool, I wish I could get this kind of stuff” and when I started collecting no one was collecting 10 years ago no one cared I just went after what I wanted it just happened that a lot of it became popular, it became things that everyone else wanted to collect at the time. When I did it I just went for stuff that I was interested in and that’s what I continue to do, I collect things today that most star wars collectors could care less about, it’s possible in 10 years they all will. For example I collect High School and College year books from the Star Wars actors, try to track down schools they went to and get the year books. Most Star Wars collectors could care less about that right now, I’m just going after it cause I like it no one else really cares about that but it’s kind of a fun thing to go for.
Thank you so much Gus for your time and knowledge this has been an eye opening interview.
Sure, no problem
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Every room has something cool to look at
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