Truly hilarious. 
Anyone Feel a Little Sorry for Anthony Daniels?
- Thread starter HugeLobes
- Start date
The one time I met Kenny Baker he came off like total class. Kind, warm, and appreciative of the fans. He even gave a free autograph to my son. Very generous.
All this is immaterial. Baker did get into the suit. Baker did take direction. Baker did perform according to the script. The quality of his acting has no impact on his or his character's place in the story.
Moreover, Daniels should concentrate on himself.
Okay, I get it. You guys like Kenny Baker.
Wrong. I never met the man.
Yes, everyone knows you have to meet someone to form an opinion...
If Kenny Baker had been as rude and unpleasant as Daniels has apparently been, everyone would probably be talking about how lucky he was to make a name for himself by sitting in a bin and jostling back and forth. Instead the fact that he brought nothing to the character is apparently 'immaterial'.
Nonsense. How likable a person is and how much credit they deserve for their work are two different things.
This little sidebar grew out of a misguided attempt to advance the notion that Baker didn't deserve to have his name where it was in the credits of the original trilogy films.
One can think that people deserve fair credit for the work they do without liking them. It's really that simple.
Plenty of people have received jobs in entertainment because of their physical features. They still do the job required of them. Nothing about their level of talent justifies them being the targets of other performer's ire. And in the end, this is not about Baker's talent. It is about Daniels' behaviour.
I didn't know him from Adam. What does that have to do with thinking it's wrong for Daniels to have treated him like crap for petty and unprovoked reasons?
Let's say as a hypothetical that everything you say is true (it's not) and Baker brought absolutely nothing to the table for R2, performance-wise. What kind of colossal prick would Daniel's have to be to begrudge a little person who had to sit in a cramped metal can for sixteen hours a day in the blazing Tunisia sun a chance for a little recognition, and then relentlessly harass and mock them for years as a result? It's "punching down" in more ways than one.
So no, I still don't feel the least bit bad for Daniels over this.
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Nope. I just believe the person who does the work deserves the credit.
As long as he did the work, he deserves credit for it. The quality of the work, and how much of a personal impact he had does not effect whether or not you deserve credit. I'm not sure of the exact rules, but I believe when it comes to movies and TV as long as work you do appears onscreen in some form you are supposed to get credit. Even if only one line from a writer's specific version of a script is used, that writer gets credit. I believe this actually happened with one of the movie Joss Whedon is credited for.
As for acting, the quality doesn't matter, you could give the worst performance in the history of media, but as long as your performance is onscreen you get credit for it.
Never met him or Daniels, but it doesn't prevent me from disliking how Daniels treated a fellow co-worker. If you're a dick, you're a dick and don't deserve an ounce of sympathy for being one.
Are you General Melvin Zais? Because you sure can pick a hill to die on.
I agree. For example, Roddy McDowall arguably spent more time in the very time-consuming (to apply and remove) ape make-up in four movies, 14 episodes of the TV series and framing scenes when the TV series was syndicated as "movies", and I've not read one story about him ranting at fellow performers, either in the "ape-ups" or not. That was an very arduous experience to go through, and he certainly made the most of it to his credit and deserved success...which was not at the expense of anyone.
Anthony Daniels was being a dick in his mistreatment of Baker.
Obviously the character wouldn’t work as well without C3PO. I’ve responded to your second point numerous times in this thread already.
Yeah, so do I. I’ve said several times I don’t think Kenny Baker should be stripped of his credit or anything. I just think that Daniels and Baker are often given a similar amount of credit for what they brought to the franchise, and I can see why that might have ticked Daniels off. Somehow this has been translated into ‘Kenny Baker deserves zero credit’. Reading through the responses on this page and they’re not actually responding to what I said.
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Well, the title of your thread is
"Anyone Feel a Little Sorry for Anthony Daniels?"
So don't be surprised when you get a lot of responses specifically to that.
Why? Both characters are droids. The only difference between them is the dialect. I love Chewbacca ever bit as much as Han Solo for similar reasons. I can't understand a word he says yet I was moved emotionally, whether laughing or sad. In the end, that's all that really matters.
Well, the title of your thread is
"Anyone Feel a Little Sorry for Anthony Daniels?"
So don't be surprised when you get a lot of responses specifically to that.
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The key word is ‘little’. As I’ve said quite a few times, you can feel a little sorry for someone even if they ultimately benefited. The example I used before was Mark Hamill. I can feel a little sorry for him getting typecast after Star Wars while acknowledging how lucky he was to get that role in the first place. Anthony Daniels clearly wouldn’t have had anything near the level of success he has now without Star Wars, but that doesn’t mean I can’t feel a tiny bit sorry for him over something else, even if his apparently being a bit of a tool makes that hard.
Yes, both are droids, but Daniels contributed way more to the character. The way he moved and spoke were all him, and he basically reinvented the character. Even other people on this thread have admitted that Baker didn’t really impact the role of R2D2. If he’d passed on the role, they’d have got another person of that size and the character wouldn’t have been at all different.
I don't even feel a "little" sorry for him. Sorry, I just don't feel bad for actors over the amount of kudos they think they should be getting. I reserve that for people who perform far more dangerous and important jobs.
Frankly I see little difference. Daniels couldn't move any quicker or different than he did thanks to the limitations of his suit. Even by Episode 3 he was still tripping and falling down. I fail to see how putting another actor in it would have changed the movement or the way he raised his arms if the suit only allowed him to move in the one manner.
Daniels was responsible for the way Threepio moved. The suit did cause problems, but if that suit was put on another actor the character would have moved differently. The main difference is that Daniels actually voiced the character and helped develop him. Look into it and you’ll find that Daniels strongly influenced Threepio.
I just think there are different degrees.
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