The Star Wars actor inside C-3PO almost didn't audition for the 'low-budget' film

Anthony Daniels didn't want to meet a relatively unknown American movie director looking for someone to play a robot in a "low-budget, science fiction film." He just wasn't a fan of the genre, but his agent persisted, telling the aspiring actor "you never know what it could lead to." It's a funny anecdote when you consider that the director was George Lucas, the sci-fi flick was Star Wars: A New Hope and the part Daniels was auditioning for was a "nervous, persnickety and uptight" human-cyborg relations protocol droid named C-3PO. More than 40 years later, Daniels is the only actor to have appeared in all nine Star Wars movies -- from 1977's A New Hope to last year's The Rise of Skywalker, released on DVD last month. Now 74, he chronicles his journey, from classically trained actor and mime in London to one of the most beloved characters in the history of filmmaking (alongside his wing man, R2-D2) in a new memoir, I Am C-3PO: The Inside Story. The story about not wanting to audition is only one of the surprises that Daniels shares. Lucas actually tested 30 other actors to give voice to C-3PO after filming was complete, including actor Richard Dreyfuss, before being convinced by a voiceover pro that Daniel's take of the droid worked best. And he re-creates (in our video interview) some of his favorite lines, calling out the scene in The Rise of Skywalker when he's about to get his memory wiped. "I also felt that this was the last movie and I was saying goodbye and taking one last look at the fans around the world, the people who have been part of the whole thing," he says.