James Earl Jones, the iconic actor who voiced Darth Vader throughout the Star Wars franchise, has died at the age of 93.
Very sad news to report today as it has been confirmed that James Earl Jones has died at the age of 93. The actor is best known for providing the iconic voice of Darth Vader throughout the Star Wars franchise, but that’s really only scratching the surface of his incredible legacy. A huge loss.
For an actor known for his deep, commanding voice, it’s remarkable that he struggled with speaking at an early age. When he was just five years old, he was sent to live with his grandparents in Michigan. The experience was so traumatic that he developed a severe stutter that led to him refusing to speak. “I was a stutterer. I couldn’t talk,” Jones explained. “So my first year of school was my first mute year, and then those mute years continued until I got to high school.” The actor credited his English teacher, Donald Crouch, with helping him overcome his stutter. Crouch discovered Jones wrote poetry and encouraged him to read it aloud to his class.
Jones took a liking to drama during his University years, and like many young actors, he got his start on the stage. He even won a Tony Award for Best Actor for his starring role in The Great White Hope and later reprised the role for the feature film adaptation. Jones made his film debut in Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, and went on to appear in movies such as Claudine, The Greatest, Exorcist II: The Heretic, Conan The Barbarian, Coming to America, Field of Dreams, The Hunt for Red October, Patriot Games, Sneakers, The Sandlot, Clear and Present Danger, Coming 2 America, and so much more.
As for Star Wars, Jones was paid just $7000 for the voice role and went uncredited for the first two films. By the time Return of the Jedi rolled around, he finally agreed to be credited as the voice of Darth Vader. “When Linda Blair did the girl in The Exorcist, they hired Mercedes McCambridge to do the voice of the devil coming out of her. And there was controversy as to whether Mercedes should get credit. I was one who thought no, she was just special effects,” Jones said in 2009. “So when it came to Darth Vader, I said, no, I’m just special effects. But it became so identified that by the third one, I thought, OK I’ll let them put my name on it.” Jones voiced the character in the original trilogy and returned for Revenge of the Sith, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, and several episodes of Star Wars: Rebels. For the Obi-Wan Kenobi series, Lucasfilm used archival recordings and AI to recreate the voice.
He also voiced Mufasa in The Lion King and even reprised the role for the 2019 remake. Next to Darth Vader, Mufasa is probably Jones’ most recognizable role, and he always enjoyed the reaction of young children as they realized he played the character. “Their parents will say, ‘There’s Mufasa!’ But I don’t look like a lion, and if they’re real little kids, they think they’re being shafted or having the wool pulled over their eyes,” Jones said in a 2011 interview. “And I can’t roar to prove it to them, but I can say [in Mufasa’s voice], ‘Simba. You have deliberately disobeyed me!’“
As I said at the start of this article, this is merely scratching the surface of James Earl Jones’s incredible life and work. He will be deeply missed, and our thoughts and condolences go out to his family and friends. May the Force be with you.
