Dubbing âStar Warsâ: Preserving the force of the Navajo language
- Arizona man works with Disney to dub 'Star Wars: A New Hope' into DineĚ to help preserve the language
- Parallels bridge 'Star Wars' with Indigenous artists through balance, harmony and anti-imperialism
- Popularity of 'Star Wars' leads to dub of 'Finding Nemo'
FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. â Manuelito Wheeler did not join millions of fans who packed into movie theaters in May 1977 to see the original âStar Wars.â He was only 7, and living with his family in remote Window Rock on the Navajo Nation, hundreds of miles from the nearest theater and with little knowledge of any galaxy far, far away.
Eighteen years later, Wheeler was the father of a 4-year-old son, sitting in the dim light of their living room one night watching the trilogy box set on VHS.
He wondered if âStar Wars: A New Hope,â as the original now was called, could be dubbed into DineĚ Bazaad, the 700-year-old language of the Navajo? There were so many parallels â of duality, of colonization, of landscape in the Indigenous land, and a force that drives people to connect through shared experiences.
Lacing a pop culture movie with Navajo voices could help preserve the DineĚ language that was disappearing. In 1980, 93% of Navajos spoke the native language. By 2010, U.S. Census data showed that number had dwindled to just about half of the Navajo nation, with children being the least likely to speak it.
âStar Warsâ appeals to those young and old and some fans can quote the movie word-for-word. Others are at least familiar enough with the dialogue to follow along in another language.
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Nearly 20 years after watching âA New Hopeâ for the first time, Wheeler, by then the director of the Navajo Nation Museum, headed the translation and dub of the dialogue into DineĚ Bazaad.
It premiered in 2013 at a dusty rodeo arena in Window Rock. Now it lives on Disney+ for subscribers worldwide.
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âPart of our language revitalization process is doing movies like this, to keep our language recorded, to keep our language alive in any way possible,â said Clarissa Yazzie, who voiced Princess Leia, or Leia Organa.
Wheeler and voice actors for the lead roles say the experience will help viewers to further understand the language while underscoring its evolving nature and interlocking Navajo Nation culture.
âThatâs something that I wasnât able to participate in as a kid,â Wheeler said. âAnd now, Iâve helped contribute to it and become part of it. Part of that âStar Warsâ family.â
When droids become 'living metal'
The thought of creating a Navajo language âStar Warsâ kept tugging at Wheeler after that living room viewing with his son. Sometime in 1996, he talked through the concept with his wife, Jennifer Wheeler, a linguist and DineĚ teacher.
He ordered the script through Amazon, which was just an online bookstore at the time, and asked his wife to translate the first 10 pages. He expected it back the next day. She returned in 10 minutes.
âThat point is when I really thought, âThis is possible,ââ Wheeler recalled.
Wheeler gathered a team, and over 36 hours, often surrounded by boxes of pepperoni and cheese pizza and liter bottles of soda, they worked line-by-line, with the occasional translation question. For instance, DineĚ has no words for âdroidâ or âlightsaber.â
Droid translated to beesh hxiinaanii, or âmetal thatâs alive.â Lightsaber, or beeshdiin, means âsword of light."
He started reaching out to anyone associated with Lucasfilm, the movie's production company. Disney and Lucasfilm signed on.
âWhen Mr. Wheeler and the Navajo Nation came to us about this project, it was immediately clear that we would do it,â says Lucasfilm's senior manager of distribution operations, Michael Kohn. âIt was an exciting opportunity to use Star Wars, a story inspired by many cultures and mythologies, to help the Navajo Nation bridge the older and younger generations while preserving their language for posterity. It was the highlight of my career.â
Wheeler got the yes he needed in spring 2013, along with funding for a premiere at the Navajo Nation Fair. He had just four months to pull it off.
He placed an ad for translators without saying what movie theyâd be translating. He needed people who were fluent at a higher level than he was. Wheeler can speak DineĚ, but he canât write it.
When five applicants arrived at the Navajo Nation Museum to get started, they were shocked to see the âStar Warsâ script on the conference table in front of them. He hired all five.
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The translation was more conceptual than literal â translators captured the meaning of the lines, not exact words. Thatâs the nature of dubbing. The translation needed an approach that got the lines correct, delivered with the right emotion and closely matched syllables.
With a full script completed, it was time to put out a call for voice actors who not only were proficient in DineĚ but knew how to channel their intergalactic characters. Organizers held auditions at the museum on May 4, known as âMay the 4th Be With You.â
Hopeful actors first did a preliminary interview, where a panel asked questions in DineĚ to gauge their grasp of the language. The audition drew about 200 people, including Terry Teller, a pharmacist from Shiprock, New Mexico, who didn't expect to land a part.
But as a longtime âStar Warsâ fan, he knew he had to go. He donned his Luke Skywalker cosplay and set off on the two-hour drive to Window Rock.
He didnât stop to refuel until he was on the border of the reservation, but a freak power outage left the gas station unable to process cards. And Teller had no cash.
âI started begging people like, âCan I just have 10 bucks? I need to get to Navajo,ââ he recalled.
Teller scraped together the cash, got to the museum on time and, to his surprise, nailed his audition. He was chosen as the voice of Luke Skywalker,
Geri Hongeva-Camarillo of Flagstaff, a media representative and mother of three, knew about the project through her work to promote the Navajo Nation Museum. She has spoken DineĚ fluently for most of her life â her family only spoke Navajo at home â although she canât write the language.
She landed the part of C3PO, making Hongeva-Camarillo the first fembot in the âStar Warsâ pantheon. She credits the coaching of her 16-year-old son, an avid fan of the films.
âHe kept saying ââMom, youâve got to talk Navajo but have a British accent a little bit. And then you got to be robotic,ââ Hongeva-Camarillo said.
One by one, the project cast four other central voice actors. Over the next weeks, actors spent hours rehearsing and recording lines.
James Junes, the voice of Han Solo, remembers pushing himself to his limits on the first day.
âI stood there in the recording studio with just a light beaming down on a script that was written in Navajo and I donât read Navajo,â Junes said.
He first struggled with getting the words right. After 10 hours without a steady, confident take, the producer asked whether Junes wanted to take a break.
He stepped outside and began screaming.
âI walked back into the recording studio and I had tears in my eyes,â Junes recalled.
Junes, defeated, started his drive back to Farmington. But on the way he had a revelation.
âI literally had to give myself a whole history lesson inside my head about the things that I was taught, the things that I needed to persevere through â how itâs going to help somebody, how, if I finish this, that Iâll be the part of something thatâs going to be probably etched in stone for the rest of my life and for the rest of Navajo history.â
Junes asked himself: âIs it worth it? Is it everything Iâve ever wanted to do?â
The answer was yes.
When Junes returned to the recording studio at 8 the next morning, he began to find his groove.
And a few hours into the session, when the producer asked whether he wanted to take a break, he said no.
âAadi kâad, ashkii. DidiĚiĚĹdǫǫŠdoĚoĚ hooghanoĚo dooleeĹ. Youâre all clear, kid, now letâs blow this thing and go home!â
Connecting generations at a premiere
On July 3, 2013, more than 2,000 people, many dressed in cosplay, crowded onto the Navajo Nation Fairgrounds in Window Rock for the world premier of the DineĚ dub. They gathered in a dusty rodeo arena and watched the film on a screen stretched out across the side of a semi-truck.
The first triumphant note of the âStar Warsâ theme blasted through the speakers, and the crowd erupted, applauding. And then the first line of the movie, spoken by Hongeva-Camarillo, followed.
âDid you hear that? They shut down the main reactor. Weâll be destroyed for sure. This is madness.â
âDisiĚntsâąĚąĚâiĚsh? BeĚeĚsh naatâaâiĚ bijeĚiĚ deineestsiz. Kâad eĚiĚ nihikâihodoolchiĚiĚĹ. Tsiâadeesdeeâ.â
Hongeva-Camarillo was nervous, worried that fans would reject a woman voicing C3PO. Instead, she heard hoots and hollers.
Yazzie sat in the crowd, too, feeling bittersweet. She watched elders and children listen to a language that connects them. When Yazzie was in high school, she was in several theater productions in DineĚ. Her grandmother was her biggest fan. But by the time the dubbed âStar Warsâ premiered, her grandmother had lost her hearing.
Junes, too, felt excitement and pride when Han Solo first flashed on-screen, and his voice filled the arena. And though he vividly remembers his scene, itâs an image off-screen that sticks with him.
âThere was a grandchild and a grandma sitting three rows up from me, watching the same movie in one language. And they both could understand it,â he said.
Junes, his voice catching as he recalls that night eight years ago, said he grew up in a violent home and overcame drug and alcohol addiction as a young adult.
Reflecting on his personal journey, Junes spoke softly.
âThatâs my proudest moment,â he said.
Using TikTok to preserve language
Many Native speakers are working to make sure the next generation preserves DineĚ in an effort to revitalize dying Indigenous languages. The language is important not just to preserve a culture, but to move forward. A candidate for tribal president of the Navajo Nation must be able to speak DineĚ.
The movieâs appeal spans generations, and the translation started conversations on the tenacity of the Navajo language.
âIt reopens a safe dialogue for people who donât speak Navajo that want to learn Navajo. It reopens dialogue for fluent speakers,â Wheeler said.
From 1860 until 1978, tens of thousands of children from Native communities across the U.S. attended boarding schools where they experienced âphysical, sexual, cultural and spiritual abuse and neglect,â according to the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition. They weren't allowed to speak their existing language.
Although not every Indigenous child was sent to boarding school, the practice resulted in generations of people with little to no connection to their native tongues.
âThatâs where the link was broken,â Wheeler said.
The Navajo language is traditionally passed down orally.
âWeâve learned it from our parents talking to us in Navajo, our grandparents talking to us in Navajo,â Yazzie said. âBut as the generations donât speak it, how is the language going to get passed down?â
After voicing Leia, Yazzie was inspired. She started creating short language learning videos, which she posts on TikTok alongside Star War cosplay and acting videos in DineĚ.
Yazzie posts basics, such as numbers and colors, and takes translation requests from followers. Itâs making a difference, she said. People young and old duet her videos and follow her short lessons.
âI started using my role as Princess Leia as a pathway because thatâs how people know me, thatâs how people recognize me,â Yazzie said. âNow that I have your attention, let me teach you something.â
The force is with our people
Tony Thibodeau, of the Museum of Northern Arizona in Flagstaff, first saw the dubbed film at Indigenous Comic-Con in 2016.
He, like Wheeler, recognized its potential.
Over the next three years, Thibodeau interviewed Navajo artists inspired by âStar Warsâ and curated an exhibition at the museum â âThe Force Is With Our People.â
The exhibit featured works by 24 Native artists that reflect a âStar Warsâ influence. Thibodeau found that âStar Warsâ resonates with Indigenous artists through three themes that connect Navajo culture to a movie with an enduring impact on pop culture: force, anti-imperialism and vast open landscapes.
Part of the exhibit is still displayed, a way to emphasize to visitors that Native people and Native cultures are not frozen in time.
âYou can go back and look at what this culture looked like 50 years ago, 100 years ago, but I think itâs also important to present aspects of what that culture looks like today,â he said. âNative people are as influenced by popular culture as anybody is.â
The sequel: 'Finding Nemo'
After the 2013 premiere of the dubbed âStar Wars: A New Hope,â Walmart stores across the Southwest stocked their shelves with DVDs of the movie. In the years since, it has become more difficult to snag a copy.
Some used their smartphones to record the movie from a DVD, which can sell for up to $200 online, and uploaded clips to YouTube. Thibodeau borrowed a copy from a library.
The movie now is available on Disney+, the subscriber-based streaming channel. Under the original listing of âStar Wars: A New Hope,â navigate to extras, and scroll to the end to find the translated version.
For many who live on the vast Navajo reservation, which stretches among three states, internet access is a problem.
Still, the movie engages a new dialogue for DineĚ Bizaad, and opens doors to expand to other movies.
Before âStar Warsâ premiered on the fairgrounds back in 2013, Wheeler and the people behind the project sat in a private screening with executives at Disney Studios in Burbank. He watched as the executives saw firsthand the impact, emotion and excitement that ensued when the Navajo language filled the small theater.
âThat turned into a meeting, which turned into potential for a movie,â Wheeler said.
That movie was âFinding Nemo.â It, too, now has been dubbed in DineĚ Bizaad and is available on Disney+.
There are aspirations for more dubbed movies. Or hope for blockbusters cast with all Navajo actors.
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That will be a tough journey, Wheeler said, but Navajos know struggle well. And âStar Warsâ involved difficult, hope-filled steps on paths to success.
âIt was obstacles that were overcome, one after another,â Wheeler said. âAnd it was worth it.â
DineĚ translations in this story of lines voiced by Hans Solo, Princess Leia and CP3O were provided by Clarissa Yazzie.
For more stories from Cronkite News, visit cronkitenews.azpbs.org.