I've had much more down in my life than I've had up. And much more struggle. First of all, when I went into the film school everybody said, "What are you doing? This is a complete dead-end for a career."

We seemed to be drifting as a society - losing touch with the basic concepts of right and wrong.

I wanted Yoda to be the traditional kind of character you find in fairy tales and mythology. And that character is usually a frog or a wizened old man on the side of the road. The hero is going down the road and meets this poor and insignificant person. The goal or lesson is for the hero to learn to respect everybody and to pay attention to the poorest person because that's where the key to his success will be.

To be renewed is everything. What more could one ask for than to have one's youth back again?

I was always extremely curious about why people did the things they do.

I am very concerned about our national heritage, and I am very concerned that the films that I watched when I was young and the films that I watched throughout my life are preserved, so that my children can see them.

'Star Wars' is fun, its exciting, its inspirational, and people respond to that. It's what they want.