Star Wars: This Oscar-winning actor should have played Han Solo!

Al Pacino in a galaxy far, far away? This was once possible because the Godfather actor was offered a famous role in the Star Wars saga. Find out the very root reason why he finally gave up.

We are in 1976. Al Pacino was crowned with his first leading roles. There’s obviously The Godfather and its sequels, but there’s also Serpico, Horror and Dog Afternoon. Then the actor just has to choose his next project and he can literally have whatever he wants. And among the characters offered to him is… Han Solo!

And Pacino just refuses, for the good and simple reason he wrote THR :

Suddenly I was given a script called Star Wars. I answer them: “I got the script, they offered me a lot of money, but I don’t understand anything.”

And here’s how Han Solo didn’t end with this chapter:

Finally, Pacino prefers the role of Formula 1 driver Bobby Deerfield, in which he responds to Marte Keller as the narrator of the love story.

Initially, moreover, the character of Han Solo was conceived by George Lucas as an extraterrestrial in the form of a large green monster. He later reviews his script and decides to cast an African-American actor (auditioning Billy Dee Williams, the future Lando Calrissian in The Empire Strikes Back).

In the end, the director changes his mind again and wants a white actor. That’s when the script would be on Al Pacino’s desk. But Lucas would eventually make the decision to hire Harrison Ford for Han Solo, who he had shot in American Graffiti and had the actors answer to while auditioning for other characters.

The funny actor ends his anecdote with a joke: “Harrison Ford owes me my career, but he never thanked me!”