'Rogue One' Director Stole Death Star Plans After Filming

And other fun stories from the set.

ByABC News
December 2, 2016, 5:01 PM

— -- Two weeks ahead of the film's anticipated release in theaters, the cast of "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story" gathered in an undisclosed location on Friday to chat about the filming process on both Twitter and thne later in the day, at Facebook headquarters.

Twitter

There was a booming applause when the cast made their entrance behind a handful of stormtroopers for the Twitter chat. Diego Luna, Felicity Jones, Alan Tudyk, Gareth Edwards, Ben Mendelsohn, Riz Ahmed and Donnie Yen were all in attendance.

The afternoon was filled with laughter as the cast shared hilarious, yet real stories, of the audition process and of filming.

Luna explained that he told his family he was just "going on a long holiday" when in reality he was headed to the studio soundstage.

"Gareth told me not to tell anyone!" he joked, adding, "my son hated my job till I took this one."

Edwards then spoke about the pressures of making a "Star Wars" film, calling it "pretty insane."

"I believe original films are masterpieces," he said. "But I can't sit in the cinema one day thinking I had the chance but didn't [do it]."

Mendelsohn, an acclaimed actor who usually takes on serious roles, gave a factious defense of his evil character Orson Krennic.

"You've got to give the Empire its due respect," he said. "We built the Death Star! ... Rebels yeah, yeah, yeah, but what makes this [movie] happen, we do."

Jones, who plays the lead Jyn Erso, spoke about the physicality of the action role.

"Every day we would be boxing outside the trailer like we were on 'Rocky,'" she joked. "But it was so much fun."

Did she get hurt at all? "All the time," she exclaimed.

Yen said the hardest part of playing a blind warrior was not being able to look his co-stars in the eyes, while Tudyk, who plays droid K-2SO, poked fun at character Jar Jar Binks.

"Though his voice was killing it," he joked of Jar Jar from "Episode I - III."

Darth Vader

The cast all agreed that Darth Vader was a very intimidating presence.

"He appears in my nightmares," Luna said.

Edwards added that his first day shooting was with Vader and Mendelsohn.

"Ben goes like, 'I need to talk to you,'" the director explained. After Mendelsohn pulled him aside, he said, "It's Darth f----- Vader [right there.]"

"It's a very intimidating thing I guess," Edwards added. "We did our homework on Darth."

The crew even tried to replicate fingerprints that were on the original mask and figured out how to shoot the legendary villain so that he was the tallest person in every shot.

The last story of the panel came from Ahmed, who explained his casting process. After sending Edwards two versions of one scene, he got antsy and decided to send him more.

"The next two days, I sent 12," he said. "He [finally] said, 'No need to send me anymore tapes.' I thought I had blown it. When he called me, I thought it was to take out restraining order against me."

Edwards joked that at the 10th tape, he thought, "I'm not sure I want to work with this guy."

Facebook

Later in the day, Facebook hosted a similar chat and spoke to the millions of watchers on the social media site.

The second panel started at around 4:30 p.m. EST and 20 minutes in, Edwards dropped a huge surprise on the cast.

When asked what the cast took after filming, he had a big answer.

Apparently, there was one item he kept asking about during filming, but the studio said it was going to archive this item, in particular. He didn't listen.

"I stole the Death Star plans," he said.

"Now you are going to have to give it back!" the cast yelled after the revelation.

"Rogue One" hits theaters on Dec. 16 nationwide.

ABC News and Lucasfilm are both part of parent company Disney Co.

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