Actor Mark Hamill opened up about his “lifelong friend” following the death of Star Wars editor Marcia Lucas, who died from metastatic cancer at the age of 80 on Wednesday.
“Marilou & I are deeply saddened by the loss of our lifelong friend, Marcia,” Hamill, 72, wrote on Instagram. The actor has been married to Marilou York since 1978. He remembered Lucas as “not just a gifted, innovative artist,” adding, “she also happened to be a genuinely nice person. Smart, funny, & just plain fun to be around.”
He added, “Thankfully, her memory lives on, and we will never stop missing her.”
The message comes after the San Francisco-based filmmaker’s family revealed that she died peacefully at her vacation home in Rancho Mirage. “Marcia will be remembered as a brilliant storyteller, a trailblazer for women in film, a loving mother and grandmother, a loyal friend whose humor and sparkle filled every room she entered,” the family said in a statement.
They added, “Her influence on film is indelible, but those who knew her best will remember the way she made life feel more vivid, more beautiful, more fun, and more full of love.” The company George Lucas founded, Lucasfilm, which he sold to Disney, added in a statement that they were “deeply saddened to learn of the passing of Marcia Lucas.”
Lucas, who was married to Star Wars creator George Lucas, 82, from 1969 to 1983, co-edited American Graffiti with him, as well as 1977’s Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope and 1983’s Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi. Lucas won the Academy Award for Best Film Editing for A New Hope.
Though she was known as Lucas’s “secret weapon,” she also worked extensively with Martin Scorsese, for whom she edited Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore (1974), Taxi Driver (1976), and New York, New York (1977).
George Lucas, who is married to investment firm CEO Mellody Hobson, has not made a direct public statement about his former wife’s death.
