Exclusive Interview with Domhnall Gleeson “General Hux” In Star Wars: The Last Jedi

Exclusive Interview with Domhnall Gleeson “General Hux” In Star Wars: The Last Jedi

I was provided an all-expense paid trip to L.A to attend the Star Wars: The Last Jedi press junket. No additional compensation was received.

Can you believe that Star Wars: The Last Jedi premiers tomorrow? Yeah, I cannot wait to see the movie either. In the meantime, I hope you are enjoying our exclusive interviews with the amazing cast. Today, we continue with our exclusive interview with Domhnall Gleeson who plays “General Hux.” So, let’s kick off this with two pieces of trivia.

As we learned during The Star Wars: The Last Jedi global press event, Mr. Domhnall Gleeson decided to forgo the cast’s pre-screening to wait to see the film during the world premiere event. And the reason was because:

I decided I would rather see it with the two thousand people who don’t know what’s going to happen. Just the feeling in the room. At the Force Awakens, that premier was insane. I was there with my dad and my friend Lawrence. Like what the hell is going on. Experience the whoops and cheering and big gasps and everything. I didn’t want to miss out on that being my first experience with the film.

Now that’s a great way to experience the film for sure. For the second piece of trivia, Did you know that you can experience a thrilling tour of the Star Wars galaxy aboard a Starspeeder 1000 in the Star Tours – The Adventures Continue ride? Yes, that right and guess who is featured in this ride? Well, if you guessed Domhnall Gleeson as General Hux? You are right, the best part is that you can experience this ride at both Disney World and Disneyland and he had this to say about how cool this is:

It’s cool. Being part of two different rides that literally millions of people will go on is kind of ridiculous. But, in a way it’s no different than the films. So many people are going to see Star Wars, yeah, it’s a bit nuts. The whole thing is a little bit nuts. It’s good though, I think.

So, here is another piece of trivia, growing up Domhnall Gleeson was more of an Indiana Jones fan than a Star Wars fan. Gasp! 🙂 However, while preparing for his role as General Hux, he did get to see the original Star Wars trilogy on the big screen, this is what he had to say about it:

I’d never seen the original trilogy, any of them in the cinema. I just missed it. And then my big experience was when I was deciding whether I could be in the Force Awakens, J.J. gave me a file of the original Star Wars, and I watched it on a big screen. And that was amazing. And then, they all became my favorites.

How cool is to get to see the original trilogy on the big screen? Now, since seeing the original trilogy, did Domhnall Gleeson take anything from past Star Wars villains and bring it into his character, General Hux? He chimed in with:

You can’t steal, right? But obviously his place in things at the beginning of the film is like Peter Cushing’s kind of role. That’s kind of, in terms of just the scheme of the way the villains are set up. He would be kind of fulfilling that role a little bit, so the wat the Peter Cu- just that very clipped English accent I liked for that. But then you have to go to the real world to find you influences. ‘Cause you can’t take your character notes from other characters. I think you want to base it on something that’s real.

You know, that you can kind of look into, so I understood where he stood in things, but no, the influences would have come from elsewhere. And also just about how he’s got to fit into the story, that was a real process with J.J. of understanding the most interesting version of Hux, and the most interesting version of Hux, it turns out, which is not there from the very beginning, was the one that’s actually very disfuntaional with Kylo Ren and kind of battling for their place in things. And for favor from Snoke. That ended up, finding that along the journey, as opposed to it being there from the very beginning.

Finally, although, the ultimate secret will not be revealed until you personally see the film. We did wonder if the story of General Hux had evolved from The Force Awakens to now in The Last Jedi. He had this to say:

The character in the first film goes from a very good place to a very bad place in terms of his standing in things. I think it’s pretty obvious, he wants his place on the throne. He wants to be in charge of Kylo Ren as a opposed to whenever Snoke goes, that’s what Hux wants. But he’s in a really much worse place at the end of the first movie than he was at the beginning in terms of achieving that goal.

And that’s where we basically start the second movie. So, just in terms of an arc, you’re just starting the character in a much worse place. A much more desperate place, much more uncomfortable place, and I think that’s a good place to put somebody like Hux. Taking a step back from him and thinking objectively, you want Hux to suffer. That is what you want for somebody like that, who behaves like that, and who carries himself like that. And I liked creating somebody that that would end up being the feeling you would have for him. So we start with a place where we’re ready to see him suffer.

In Lucasfilm’s Star Wars: The Last Jedi, the Skywalker saga continues as the heroes of The Force Awakens join the galactic legends in an epic adventure that unlocks age-old mysteries of the Force and shocking revelations of the past.

Star Wars: The Last Jedi arrives in theaters everywhere on December 15, 2017