Mark Hamill says security on Episode IX is like “being in the CIA”

Access to the internet has made it so movies can be spoiled before they’re finished filming, so precautions need to be taken. Film sets run by J.J. Abrams are notoriously locked down like the deepest levels of the Pentagon, and the set of STAR WARS: EPISODE IX is no different. In fact, according to star Mark Hamill things may be even more intense this time around, saying it feels like “being in the CIA.”

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Hamill – who is returning to play Luke Skywalker one last time (probably in the form of a Force ghost) – was recently interviewed by EW while on the set of season two of the History Channel drama, KNIGHTFALL. There, he talked about how he had yet to shoot most of the scenes for the upcoming space epic, but that he was being sent a script to look over before he goes back for shooting. Or rather, a person with a briefcase was being sent to him, and the script was tagging along.

“I still have to go over and do [Episode IX]. Most of the parts I have coming up beside Star Wars are voiceover — there’s one big one, very high profile, I can’t announce now, that I’m really excited about. You know how it is these days, every time you sign NDAs. I remember back when I read the first Star Wars [script], I was like, ‘Wow, that’s the goofiest thing I’ve ever read.’ I gave it to my best friend to read, and I said, ‘What do you think of it?’ He said, ‘It’s really wild, it’s crazy, can I give it to Meredith?’ ‘Sure, go ahead.’ It went around to all my friends. Of course back then nobody cared. Nowadays it’s like working for some secret deep state government organization, like being in the CIA. They’re going to send rewrites over to Prague on this dark red paper that gives you a headache to read.”

Hamill continued, saying the person will wait for Hamill to finish the pages (which are printed on the dark red paper so that any attempts to copy them will render the copied paper black and unreadable), and then take the script away to go back with him to whatever secret volcano lair it's housed in.

“They’re going to fly [the rewrites] over with somebody from the company. They’re going to come and give it to me and wait for me to read it before I give it back. So no pressure! You can’t even keep it overnight. But that’s the way it is now.”

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Though the “red pages” were used on FORCE AWAKENS, Hamill talked about how he likes to keep the script so he can make little doodles on the margins, or any kind of notes, to help him remember certain things. Even on the set of THE LAST JEDI he got to keep his script, albeit he had to keep it secret…keep it safe.

They wound up letting me keep a script when we were doing [The Last Jedi], but I had to lock it up in a safe every night and then carry it with me and never let it out of my sight. And I can understand why — if [a script] gets out it ruins it for everyone.”

STAR WARS: EPISODE IX is set for December 20, 2019.