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.
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