I see the new owners of Lucasfilm, the legendary Disney company, have announced they are planning a new Star Wars film every year.

I guess they need to recoup the reported billions of dollars they paid George Lucas for his company and rights to the franchise.

It is amazing to think 37 years ago, most people had little faith in the new film called Star Wars being shot at Elstree Studios.

I certainly hold my hand up as I remember saying to Mr Lucas science-fiction in the cinema was as dead as the western and the musical!

The sets were great but when I asked about the cast, they all seemed to be unknowns, other than guest appearances by veterans Alec Guinness and Peter Cushing.

At the time, Peter told me he took the film mainly to keep working as a way of dealing with his beloved wife’s death a few years earlier and was not really a sci-fi fan.

He also found it amusing that his uniform reminded him of something worn by an Edwardian chauffeur and the boots were so tight that in several scenes, when being filmed from the waist up, he wore carpet slippers. Not quite the frightening image you expect of someone in charge of a death star.

Alec, of course, grew to hate his association with the role, fearing it would overshadow everything else he had done, although I suspect his percentage of the profits helped in this regard.

Earlier this year, Warner Bros celebrated their 90th birthday as a company and today, their UK home is the giant Leavesden Studios that also houses the Harry Potter tour.

Not a lot of people know that from the 1940s until 1969, Warner Bros held a large stake in ABPC, which was the company that ran Elstree Studios.

The hope was they would send over their top stars like James Cagney, Humphrey Bogart, Joan Crawford and Bette Davis to star in films at Elstree, but we ended up with Ronald Reagan. Still, he went on to become president of the United States and not many towns can say such a powerful figure once worked here.

It was nice to get an email from veteran Elstree director Michael Anderson, who now lives in Canada, the other day.

Michael is now 94 and started as a teenage actor in Elstree films in the 1930s before becoming a runner.

He still recalls cycling from St John’s Wood each day and making his way up the showbiz ladder.
He went on to direct a number of films including the blockbuster Around The World In 80 Days, but is best remembered for The Dam Busters.

It is sad to see a number of familiar screen faces of yesteryear have passed away over the past couple of months.

Among them were screen heavy Charles Durning; western movies star Harry Carey Jr aged 91; Dale Robertson, who starred in the television series Wells Fargo in the 1950s; Peter Gilmore, who starred in The Onedin Line; and Jon Finch, who appeared in a number of films in the 1960s and 1970s, including some made at Elstree. It is also sad to say goodbye to actor John Kerr, aged 81.

John had great success in the 1950s starring in such films as Tea And Sympathy, Gaby and, of course, South Pacific as the young leading man.

He later chose to pursue a successful career as a lawyer with just the occasional acting role.

We concluded our most recent season of Borehamwood-made productions at the University of Hertfordshire campus theatre with a double-bill screening of The Avengers and The Prisoner —  two iconic 1960s television series.

More than 100 people turned up, including some of those who had worked on the
productions and it was a fun evening.

It is nice to keep the flag flying for the town’s unique film and television history, especially as we move towards the centenary celebrations next year.