CT David Prowse/Sebastian Shaw

Does anyone know why David Prowse was not "the face" of Darth Vader in Return of the Jedi? Is there a specific reason that explains why Sebastian Shaw was cast to play that crucial scene where Luke sees his father's face for the first time?

 

Maybe they needed an ACTOR to portray Anakin?

 

Age difference, Sebastian Shaw was more well known plus a more talented actor.

 

Hmm.... Prowse delivered a ludicrous vocal performance in IV, but having heard JEJ's dubbing, does anyone know how he fared on the set of V?

There was some recent skit where some journalist/nerd guy came into Prowse's house to get a revenge/rematch or whatever, and Prowse brought some good, decent sounding Vader impression. I think he could very much handle a dark, villainous role now, he has the seasoned face, the charisma and the vocal capabilities.

 

Indeed. Shaw did a magnificent job. I really felt for Anakin the first time I saw Shaw's performance, and I still do. You can tell that there was more to this man than hate, anger, and fear. That's the best part of his characterization.

 

I believe one consideration was the fact that they didn't want Darth Vader to have a British accent.

His accent is suppose to roughly match JEJ, as well as Luke's.

 

whaaaaaa-a-a-a-aa-a-a-aaa-aa-aaaa

JEJ speaks posh English, Luke American. Christensen also American (gotta check if he moves into English when turning evil.. might have, not sure), and Shaw was English if I remember correctly.

 

Sebastian Lewis Shaw (29 May 1905 – 23 December 1994) was an English actor, director, novelist, playwright and poet.

 

The whole accent thing is rather baffling

Shaw didn't really have enough lines to properly derive his accent, and at that, he's practically whispering. I can sort of hear the English accent, I suppose, but it seems a tad ambiguous
Interesting that JEJ was told to imitate an English accent when voicing Vader and Hayden just used his natural American accent

Then again, they tend to meld together a bit for me because of an upbringing with an English mother and American father....

 

Admittedly, I didn't realize Shaw was British. But it's still possible he could imitate an American accent better than Prowse.

James Earl Jones and Mark Hamill are Americans, and Hayden is Canadian. Their accents are not identical, but they are much closer to each other than to a British accent.

 

I could always hear Shaw's English accent in his pronunciation of the words "sister" and "were" as "sisteh" and "weh", and the way he glides the final "t" of "right" into the opening vowel of "about", so that, to an American ear such as mine, it sounds like "Tell your sisteh, you weh righ tabout me." For whatever that's worth.

 

Yes, JEJ is American; so is Peter Dinklage.
Vader and Tyrion have English accents - so pronounced and stereotypical, it's baffling when people miss that.

 

Incorrect. Jones is not doing an English accent; he's doing a Mid-Atlantic accent like that heard in Golden Age Hollywood films.

A Mid-Atlantic accent (also known as a Transatlantic accent)[1] is a cultivated or acquired accent of the English language once found in the American upper class and taught for use as a standard in American schools for actors. It is not a vernacular accent typical of any location or any natural variety, but a consciously learned blend of American English and British English, intended to favor neither.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mid-Atlantic_accent

 

They say Leia is doing a Mid-Atlantic in that Tarkin scene as well, but everyone including Carrie calls it English - either way, MA is much closer related to RP than RP to any other notable English accent;
in crude terms, it can be said that it's just posh Americans talking British.

To convey an American upper class, there are other American accents and speech manners that can convey that.

 

The reason why they had Sebastian Shaw as Darth Vader/Anakin Skywalker instead of David Prowse was because it shows that Darth Vader was an undeveloped man.