John Mollo, the Oscar-winning costume designer of “Star Wars,” died on Wednesday at age 86, several outlets report.
The Times of London confirmed Mollo’s death.
Mark Hamill, who played Luke Skywalker in the original space adventure trilogy, called the London-born Mollo “brilliant” and said he figured prominently in the look of “Star Wars” (1977) and its sequel, “The Empire Strikes Back” (1980).
Mollo adapted designer Ralph McQuarrie’s concept art to bring the iconic looks of Han Solo, Princess Leia, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Darth Vader and others to life.
“The characters look as fresh today as they did 40 years ago, which sounds incredibly conceited, but I rather think that that is true,” Mollo told Entertainment Weekly in 2015.
Recommendations from “Star Wars” creator George Lucas also helped with the vision, he said.
“George made pronouncements of a general nature,” Mollo told the official “Star Wars” website in 2014. “First of all, he wanted the Imperial people to look efficient, totalitarian, fascist; and the Rebels, the goodies, to look like something out of a Western or the U.S. Marines. He said, ‘You’ve got a very difficult job here, because I don’t want anyone to notice the costumes. They’ve got to look familiar, but not familiar at the same time.’”
When Mollo won the Academy Award for Best Costume Design for the film, he said at the 1978 ceremony, “As you see, the costumes from ‘Star Wars’ are really not so much costumes as a bit of plumbing and general automobile engineering.”
Mollo won his second Oscar for “Gandhi.”
He also dressed up “Alien,” “Cry Freedom,” “Air America,” “Chaplin” and other films. According to IMDb, his last credit was on “Hornblower: Duty” in 2003.
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