George Lucas was at last Friday's NAACP Image awards and ForceCast listener Adam was nice enough to send over the following report and link...
"George received the Vanguard Award at the 43rd NAACP Image Awards this past Friday, as aired on NBC, for Red Tails. But they also acknowledged his legendary film making with a SUPERB montage of all his films ? heavy on Star Wars. Samuel L. Jackson presented the award with a very funny speech, heavy on Lando banter! And George?s acceptance speech was very well-received. Brought Melody to tears, actually.
In any case, the link for the entire program is here.
The tribute is about half way into the program, where there?s a long stretch in the middle between the commercial breaks."
Thanks Adjua! We've embedded the full program below (the Lucas segment starts at around 41:45). Here's a transcript of Samuel L. Jackson's speech introducing the Lucas video montage:
"Good evening, fellow humans. I am here to present the Vanguard Award to my friend, Mr. George Lucas. Now, I can stand up here and talk about what a visionary George is, and how myths define culture, and all that good Joseph Campbell stuff. But, I?m gonna tell you straight: I love Star Wars. I have always loved Star Wars. The stories, the action, the characters. Luke, Han Solo, my man Chewbacca, and then he busted out Billy Dee Williams as Lando Calrissian ? mackin?, in a cape, cruising in the Millennium Falcon, diamond in the back, sunroof, I mean?
But Lando was not a Jedi Master. I?ll tell you the truth, when I asked George to be in the next Star Wars series, I told him, ?Look, I?ll do anything. I?ll be a stormtrooper, I just wanna run across the screen. Nobody even needs to know I?m in it.? But he made me Mace Windu. The second baddest cat in the universe, ?cause Yoda is still the baddest. Let us now take a look at some of the ways George has changed the way we look at movies and the way we look at ourselves."