Hayden Christensen joins WIRED to answer his most searched questions from Google. How did he land his role as Anakin Skywalker? What's his relationship with Ewan McGregor like? Can he play the piano? The actor answers all these questions and more!AHSOKA is now streaming on Disney+Director: Lisandro Perez-ReyDirector of Photography: AJ YoungEditor: Cory Stevens; Matthew ColbyTalent: Hayden ChristensenLine Producer: Joseph BuscemiAssociate Producer: Paul GulyasProduction Manager: Peter BrunetteProduction Coordinator: Rhyan LarkTalent Booker: Jenna Caldwell; Lauren MendozaCamera Operator: Josh AndersenSound Mixer: Kari BarberProduction Assistant: Liza Antonova; Brock SpitaelsPost Production Supervisor: Christian OlguinPost Production Coordinator: Ian BryantSupervising Editor: Doug LarsenAssistant Editor: Justin Symonds
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00:00Hello, I'm Hayden Christensen, and this is my WIRED Autocomplete Interview.
00:09I heard Google myself when I was a bit younger, but it's been a very long time.
00:13It was all surprising and shocking, and I never did it again.
00:19All right, what do we have here?
00:21Did Hayden Christensen watch the Clone Wars?
00:25I did.
00:26I watched the Clone Wars when I was coming back to Star Wars to get ready for the Obi-Wan
00:31Kenobi show.
00:32I was just sort of reimmersing myself in all things Star Wars, and I thought they did a
00:37great job with these characters and brought in some new characters and really great storytelling.
00:42How did Hayden Christensen get the role of Anakin Skywalker?
00:48I auditioned for it, like a lot of other people.
00:50I went in and I met with the casting director first, and then I went to the Skywalker ranch
00:56and I got to meet with George Lucas, which was thrilling.
00:59And then I got to go back to the Skywalker ranch and I auditioned with Natalie Portman.
01:03Maybe a few days later, I got one of the best phone calls of my life saying that I
01:06got the part.
01:07Just a lot of training to figure out the lightsaber stuff.
01:10They knew that I had some athletic inclinations.
01:13I played a lot of hockey and tennis as a kid, so they thought maybe I'd be able to pick
01:16up a lightsaber and handle myself.
01:18But it was a lot of time spent with Nick Gillard, the fight choreographer of the prequels,
01:25and that was some of my favorite stuff was going to Jedi training camp and learning how
01:30to fight with a lightsaber.
01:31When did Hayden Christensen play Darth Vader?
01:35I played Darth Vader when we did Revenge of the Sith very briefly at the end of that film,
01:40and then I got to play him again when we came back to do the Obi-Wan Kenobi show just recently.
01:45It was a great thrill.
01:47I'd spent a lot of time playing Anakin, but to get to sort of spend some time as Darth
01:53Vader was a nice continuation of my journey with the character.
01:58Will Hayden Christensen play Anakin again?
02:02That would be a lot of fun.
02:03I think that the answer to that question remains to be seen.
02:06All right.
02:07Does Hayden Christensen go to conventions?
02:11I have started going to conventions.
02:13I didn't for a while, and then I did, and I enjoyed it, and I had fun, and so now I
02:18go every now and then when I can.
02:19Does Hayden Christensen have social media?
02:22I do not have any social media.
02:25Never say never.
02:25Maybe one day.
02:26Did Hayden Christensen like playing Anakin Skywalker?
02:30Is this?
02:31Yeah, Skywalker.
02:32I did.
02:32I loved playing Anakin Skywalker.
02:34Just getting to play a Jedi Knight was so much fun.
02:37Putting that costume on every day and having a lightsaber hang from your belt was a pretty
02:42cool thing, and just to play the character that becomes Darth Vader.
02:45He's got a lot of sort of inner conflict and lots of emotions he's always dealing
02:52with.
02:52There's a lot going on underneath the surface.
02:54Probably one of my favorite roles I've ever gotten to play.
02:56I love the character.
02:57I love Star Wars, so yeah, I definitely did.
03:00Does Hayden Christensen play video games?
03:04I used to play a lot of video games.
03:06Not so much anymore.
03:07Ever since I became a dad, I was big into Call of Duty, Halo, and then FIFA.
03:15FIFA was kind of my go-to.
03:17Manchester United was the team I usually played with.
03:19Does Hayden Christensen have any tattoos?
03:22No.
03:23No, I don't have any tattoos.
03:24Too indecisive to commit to a tattoo.
03:29All right.
03:30Is Hayden Christensen Mark Hamill's nephew?
03:34No, I'm not related to Mark Hamill in any way.
03:38I've met him a couple times.
03:40Great guy.
03:41But yeah, we are not related.
03:42Is Hayden Christensen a farmer?
03:46No, I'm not.
03:47I'm not actually a farmer.
03:49I do have a farm.
03:52Or it was a working farm when I bought it, but I stopped farming the land.
03:56So I'm not really a farmer.
03:58Although I do own a tractor.
04:00I don't know who really owns a tractor other than a farmer.
04:02So it's a gray area.
04:04Is Hayden Christensen a footballer?
04:07No, not a footballer.
04:08I played when I was a little kid.
04:11And then I played in a charity match called Soccer Aid.
04:16And I think if you go online, you can see a video of probably the exact moment when
04:21I lost the soccer game for my team.
04:24It was a close game.
04:25It was a tight game.
04:26And then it went to a penalty shootout.
04:28And when I went up to do mine, it just didn't go very well.
04:31And the coach actually, his one bit of advice to me was to keep it on the ground.
04:37And then I went up to strike the ball.
04:40And I was just like, I'm going to give it everything I've got.
04:42And I nailed the sucker.
04:43And it just went flying over the net, which is probably like a very Anakin thing to do
04:48when you think about it.
04:49Is Hayden Christensen CGI in Ahsoka?
04:54No, I was actually there.
04:56That was me.
04:57I was digitally de-aged a little bit, but not a computer generated image.
05:03Is Hayden Christensen in Rise of Skywalker?
05:06No, but my voice is very briefly, if you listen closely.
05:11Is Hayden Christensen Danish?
05:13No, I'm part Swedish.
05:15My last name is Danish.
05:16I don't really know how that happened.
05:18But no, I'm a bit of a part Swedish, part Italian, and then part like English, Irish,
05:23Scottish, something sort of hard to track.
05:25That's the end of that one.
05:26All right.
05:27What was Hayden Christensen's first movie?
05:30My first movie was a John Carpenter film called In the Mouth of Madness.
05:35I was maybe 12 or 13 at the time.
05:38And I was in one scene.
05:40I played a paper boy.
05:41And it was with Sam Neill.
05:42And I was so excited because it was just after Jurassic Park had came out.
05:46And so I was really excited to get to be in a movie with him.
05:49I think I was giving Sam Neill directions.
05:52Both he and John Carpenter were very kind people.
05:56And I remember John Carpenter gave me a gift basket at the end of the day.
06:00And a very nice handwritten card, which I think I still have somewhere.
06:04What is Hayden Christensen's favorite song?
06:08I don't know that I have a favorite song.
06:10It's hard to pick just one.
06:12When I was a kid, like if you asked me when I was like 9 or 10 years old,
06:15I would have said Great Balls of Fire by Jerry Lee Lewis.
06:18It was one of the first songs I learned to play on the piano.
06:20And I performed it at a family member's wedding one time when I was quite young.
06:24And then I also used to really love Faith by George Michael.
06:28Anytime that came on the radio when I was like driving the car with my mom,
06:31I used to rock out to that song.
06:33What school did Hayden Christensen go to?
06:38I went to Unionville High School in Ontario, Canada.
06:42And it was a really good school.
06:45It was a public school, but it had an arts program within the sort of mainstream high school.
06:51And I went to the theater program there.
06:53We did like half a year studying Shakespeare, and I got to play Hamlet.
06:57I really sort of connected with the role.
06:59And that was definitely a moment for me where I thought like
07:02this would be something I'd really like to continue with
07:05and maybe try to make a profession out of.
07:07For sure, there's lots of comparisons you can make to Hamlet and Anakin.
07:10They're both very sort of impulsive characters who tend to sort of act before they think.
07:16I've certainly been accused of that myself too.
07:18But yeah, there's lots of similarities there.
07:19Maybe that helped me in my pursuit of playing Anakin.
07:23What languages does Hayden Christensen speak?
07:28Sadly, I really only speak English.
07:29I wish I was multilingual, but I can speak a little bit of French.
07:33Not very well, but in Canada, it's, you know,
07:36a part of the sort of mandatory curriculum that you study French up until grade nine.
07:41And then after grade nine, I didn't continue with it.
07:43I'd be able to fake my way through ordering at a French restaurant.
07:47But as soon as I get into a conversation with someone,
07:49then they pretty quickly realize that it's not a language I should really be communicating in.
07:54Bonjour, comment ça va?
07:56All right, next up.
07:57How old was Hayden Christensen during Revenge of the Sith?
08:06I think I was about 22 years old when I did Revenge of the Sith,
08:10or when we started.
08:11The filming on those would go on for a couple of years.
08:14So I was probably 22, 23 when I did that.
08:18Where is Hayden Christensen from?
08:22I'm from Canada.
08:22I was born in Vancouver, Canada.
08:25And then my family moved to Toronto when I was like five years old,
08:29and I grew up in the suburbs of Toronto.
08:31Are Hayden Christensen and Ewan McGregor friends?
08:37Yeah.
08:37Yeah, we are friends.
08:38I love Ewan.
08:40He's a great guy, a great actor.
08:42And it was so nice to get to come back and do the Obi-Wan show with him.
08:46And now we see each other every now and then, and it's been really nice.
08:50So yes, we are friends.
08:52Can Hayden Christensen play the piano?
08:55Yeah.
08:56Yeah, I can play the piano.
08:57I took a lot of piano lessons when I was a kid,
08:59and I learned how to play sort of jazz and blues, which was my interest.
09:03I can't read any, you know, sheet music or anything,
09:06but I can sit down and have some fun at the piano.
09:10There's a lot people don't know about me.
09:12Some interesting things to be curious about.
09:14Thank you, Wired.
09:15This was fun.
09:15I hope you learned something.
09:16Till next time.