Australian actor Peter Sumner has died after a long illness. “Star Wars” fans knew him as Lieutenant Pol Treidum, who served as an Imperial officer on the Death Star in the original 1977 film. He uttered his most famous line, “TK-421 do you copy?”, right before being backhanded by an angry Chewbacca in the control room overlooking the hangar bay which held the Millennium Falcon. You can read more about the veteran actor after the jump.
Peter Sumner shared with the Sydney Morning Herald about his two days worth of work he performed for “Star Wars”:
“I had an agent in London and she rang and said, ‘There’s this strange little American sci-fi movie and there are couple of days work in it.’ As we were broke, the first first thing I said was, ‘How much?’
“She said, ‘£60 a day.’ I said, ‘I’ll take it.'”
Sumner went to Elstree Studios for the shoot.
“I was absolutely amazed at the sets that had been built,” he says. “On the first day, when the second or third assistant took me up to the control room set that I was working in, I was standing on the back wall when this man suddenly appeared at my side.
“His glasses were crooked and he had an old white shirt and grey pants on. I thought he was an accountant of some sort.
“We got talking – being Australian always interests people – and just as I was about to say, ‘And who are you?’, the first came over and said, ‘Mr Lucas, we’re ready.’ That was my meeting with George Lucas.”
You can check out more from the article right here.
Peter Sumner reprised his role as Lieutenant Pol Treidum in the 1999 “Star Wars” fan-film “The Dark Redemption.” The 24-minute short is “set just two days before the events of ‘Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope.’ It tells of how Mara Jade with other Rebels captured the plans for the first Death Star.” Obviously, this would be considered part of the “Legends” now.