One Man Star Wars reviewed

(Photo courtesy of the Lone Tree Arts Center)

In this week's edition of The Guide, we talked to Charles Ross, creator of the "One Man Star Wars" show that hit the Lone Tree Arts Center last night and is scheduled for a second run (in less than 12 parsecs) tonight at 8 p.m. We sent our intrepid sports editor Courtney Oakes to the show last night to take in three epic movies' worth of material in a single hour. His review is after the jump.

For the one person in the audience who hadn’t seen any of the movies in the Star Wars trilogy, Charles Ross had some advice during his Thursday performance of “One-Man Star Wars Trilogy.” 

“I feel sorry for you; the only thing you are going to get from this show is spat upon,” quipped Ross, early on in his one-man rendition of the dialogue and action from George Lucas’ “Star Wars: The New Hope,” “Empire Strikes Back” and “Return of the Jedi” — delivered in just one hour.

For the rest of the near-capacity crowd at the sparkling new Lone Tree Arts Center — including the majority who admitted to having watched all six Star Wars flicks in a single day — Ross’ comedic-laced spin on the classic films drew wild hoots and plenty of applause.

Ross delivers frenetic snippets of each movie mixed with improv, correcting his own mistakes, satyrizing dialogue choices like Luke Skywalker’s use of the metric system when attacking the Death Star — “I used to bullseye womp rats in my T-16 back home, they’re not much bigger than two meters” — and riffing off the missed cue of his lighting director, lending a unique spin to a performance he has delivered around the country thousands of times over the last 11 years.

With only a swig of water between movies and clad only in a black jumpsuit, Ross is a whirling dirvish of impressions — from a strong Darth Vader to an admittedly mediocre Yoda and adding a creative spin on the monstrous Jabba The Hutt — sound effects and theme music, weaving together a well-known storyline to the delight of numerous families and older fans of the franchise.

When he was finished, having blown up the Death Star at the end of “Return of the Jedi,” Ross closed with a brief story about how he started the show as a short-lived skit in a comedy routine and Lucasfilms Ltd. got wind of it and has since given him a thumbs up. Ross also indicated his hope to bring his other show — “One-man Lord of the Rings” — to the Lone Tree Arts Center.

- Courtney Oakes