Voice of beloved Star Wars character, Boba Fett, has died

Sad news in that Jason Wingreen, who was the voice behind the beloved Star Wars character, Boba Fett, has died at the age of 95. He died at his Los Angeles home on Christmas day, his son, Ned, told The Hollywood Reporter.

Interestingly, the actor originally auditioned to voice Yoda in The Empire Strikes Back (1980), but was given four lines of dialogue for the popular bounty hunter instead. Equally interestingly, he wasn’t actually credited for his work – receiving no residuals for the performance (his voice can even heard on some Boba Fett action figures) – and it wasn’t publicly known that it was his voice until around the year 2000. But he said “the actual work, aside from the hellos and goodbyes and all that, could have been no more than 10 minutes”.

In addition to his work on Star Wars, Wingreen starred in classic American sitcoms All in the Family and Archie Bunker’s Place. He also appeared in some episodes of Seinfeld and The Twilight Zone, and many other TV shows and films (he has almost 200 credits listed on IMDb).

He is survived by his son, his two grandchildren, and his sister, Harriet.