inspired by What has been Harrison Ford's attitude toward Star Wars?
I've heard claims here and there about Alec Guinness's attitude toward the Star Wars franchise, with some claiming that he hates it or used to hate it, etc.
Did he like Star Wars and then grew to dislike it? Or vice versa? If he ever did dislike Star Wars, then why? etc.
Basically, what has been Alec Guinness's attitude(s) towards Star Wars?
Here's what he wrote in a letter to a friend when he was first approached for a role in the original Star Wars:
I have been offered a movie (20th Cent. Fox) which I may accept, if they come up with proper money. London and N. Africa, starting in mid-March. Science fiction – which gives me pause – but is to be directed by Paul [sic] Lucas who did "American Graffiti, which makes me feel I should. Big part. Fairy-tale rubbish but could be interesting perhaps.
And here's his commentary from while he was on set:
... new rubbish dialogue reaches me every other day on wadges of pink paper – and none of it makes my character clear or even bearable. I just think, thankfully, of the lovely bread, which will help me keep going until next April even if Yahoo collapses in a week ... I must off to studio and work with a dwarf (very sweet – and he has to wash in a bidet) and your fellow countrymen Mark Hamill and Tennyson (that can't be right) Ford. Ellison (? – No!) – well, a rangy, languid young man who is probably intelligent and amusing. But Oh, God, God, they make me feel ninety – and treat me as if I was 106. – Oh, Harrison Ford – ever heard of him?
(all emphasis mine; source)
From this 1982 interview:
But . . . the 'Star Wars' pictures. How did I like doing them? I liked the people very much. But, no, they're not really much fun to act in, not when you're put totally in the hands of technicians and asked to sit in a cylinder and imagine explosions. That's only amusing for a time.
In addition to rand al'thor's answer, one anecdote about Alec Guinness which I find funny, and which illustrates his well-known dislike for Star Wars is this one:
A kid approached him, asking for his autograph and claiming to have seen Star Wars "a hundred times". Alec Guinness gave the autograph on the condition the kid promised him never to watch it again.
A refurbished Star Wars is on somewhere or everywhere. I have no intention of revisiting any galaxy. I shrivel inside each time it is mentioned. Twenty years ago, when the film was first shown, it had a freshness, also a sense of moral good and fun. Then I began to be uneasy at the influence it might be having. The bad penny first dropped in San Francisco when a sweet-faced boy of twelve told me proudly that he had seen Star Wars over a hundred times. His elegant mother nodded with approval. Looking into the boy’s eyes I thought I detected little star-shells of madness beginning to form and I guessed that one day they would explode.
“I would love you to do something for me,” I said.
“Anything! Anything!” the boy said rapturously.
“You won’t like what I’m going to ask you to do,” I said.
“Anything, sir, anything!”
“Well,” I said, “do you think you could promise never to see Star Wars again?”
He burst into tears. His mother drew himself up to an immense height. “What a dreadful thing to say to a child!” she barked, and dragged the poor kid away. Maybe she was right but I just hope the lad, now in his thirties, is not living in a fantasy world of secondhand, childish banalities.
I knew this anecdote from a newspaper article, but Wikipedia gives the source as the book "A Positively Final Appearance" (additional source).
