Star Wars: James Earl Jones steps down as Darth Vader – but AI Ukraine means his voice will live | News about Ant-Man & Art

Star Wars villain Darth Vader’s voice actor has signaled he’s stepping down from the role – but has licensed the use of his voice for future productions.

James Earl Jones first voiced Darth Vader in the original 1977 Star Wars and went on to perform in The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi.

However, Star Wars supervisor sound editor Matthew Wood told Vanity Fair that the 91-year-old actor “is looking to take down this particular character”.

Jones went on to voice over films including the first installment of the Star Wars anthology series, Rogue One, and the third installment of the sequel trilogy, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.

Future projects by Disney and Lucasfilm will use artificial intelligence-synthetic voice technology to recreate Jones’ younger voice from his previous films.

Ukraine-based voice cloning company Respeecher will use AI technology to create new conversations from resurrected old voice recordings.

They’ve previously remade his voice from the original Star Wars movies for the recent Disney+ Obi-Wan Kenobi series, and several archival recordings of his voice have also been released. use.

Wood said Jones’ family was delighted with the outcome, and he described Jones as “a benevolent godfather” for his advice on performing the role during production.

The Ukrainian startup also teamed up with Lucasfilm to create the voice of young Luke Skywalker for the Disney+ series, The Book of Boba Fett.

Wood said that the Kyiv-based team was affected by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine but managed to pull through to get the gig.

Some of Jones’ most famous lines from the much-loved Star Wars franchise include: “No, I’m your father”; “You don’t know the power of the dark side! I must obey my master” and “The force is very strong with this guy”.

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While Jones voiced the role, late actor David Prowse appeared on screen, dressed in Darth Vader’s iconic costume with a black mask, helmet, and floor-length cape.

A respected actor of stage and screen during his six-decade career, Jones also voiced Mufasa in Disney’s The Lion King, and played King Jaffe Joffer in Coming To America alongside Eddie Murphy, in turn. reprise both roles in the remake and sequel.