Old School. Biblically Independent.
By Kayleigh Donaldson | Film | August 19, 2026
The force will be with you, always, and across language barriers. This Christmas, Lucasfilm and Disney are partnering with S4C and Creative Wales to produce the first-ever Welsh-language dub of Star Wars: A New Hope. The cast will include Rhys Ifans as Obi-Wan Kenobi, Aimee-Ffion Edwards, best known for her roles in Peaky Blinders and Slow Horses, as Princess Leia, and the mayor of Widow’s Bay himself, Matthew Rhys, as Han Solo.
It’s obviously a very big deal for Rhys, who doesn’t get a ton of acting opportunities to be as exceedingly Welsh as he is. And who doesn’t want to be Han Solo? Well, Harrison Ford seems less keen on it than he does with being Indiana Jones. He’ll go to the grave fighting to stop Chris Pratt from stealing that gig. Anyway, Rhys told the New York Times podcast The Interview that the experience of speaking his first language in a legendary dub like this has been pretty emotional. And kind of terrifying.
“What was weird is obviously, they’d had to translate all these things that we’d grown up with, knowing Star Wars,” he said. “I was saying in Welsh things like ‘pelydr cyrchu’… it’s kind of like ‘tractor beam’. There were words I’ve never used before, and I was tripping on them. At the same time, it was this wildly familiar thing that I got to do. The whole thing was surreal. And then you go, I can’t voice Harrison Ford!” When asked if he’d spoken to Ford about the job, he said, “No. I’m too scared!”
Fair enough. His default mode is grouch, which we respect! Rhys also talked about being inspired by fellow Welsh actors like Richard Burton and falling in love with his partner and The Americans co-star Keri Russell. Do you think she asked him to wear the Han Solo outfit for research? I would have.
