At Saturday’s “Star Wars: In Concert’’ matinee at the TD Garden, the costumed Luke Skywalkers and Darth Vaders in the audience were almost all pint-size. Their parents grew up on the three original George Lucas films in the 1970s and ’80s, but many of these children weren’t even born when the second trilogy debuted in 1999. It didn’t appear to hamper their enjoyment. In the lobby before the show, they ooohed over movie props and eagerly posed for snapshots with actors in banged-up Imperial stormtrooper costumes.
‘Star Wars: In Concert’ excites a new young audience
Inside the arena, a full symphony orchestra and chorus performed arrangements from John Williams’s scores, while exciting footage from all six “Star Wars’’ movies was shown on a giant high-def LED screen above the orchestra. It all came packaged like a rock show, with lasers and jets of flame.
Some of the film montages covered the epic story line in CliffsNotes fashion, while others focused on topics such as the relationship of Padmé Amidala and Anakin Skywalker or the comic teaming of droids C-3PO and R2-D2.
Tying it all together as host was Anthony Daniels, the actor inside the gold C-3PO suit in the movies, who wore a sort of tux here. Daniels has said the movies aren’t his cup of tea. But standing on stage Saturday - while shown many times life size on the giant screen above - he introduced each clip with an unctuous sincerity, as if he believed this to be the greatest story ever told.
Seeing bits of all the movies mixed together made clear how much more fun we had with Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, and Carrie Fisher than with the lugubrious cast of the second trilogy. Williams’s scores seemed all of a piece, though. The orchestra was in fine form, and the music swooped and soared and elicited chuckles in all the right places. And the youngsters conducting along with maestro Dirk Brossé with their glowing light saber key chains got a healthy dose of real, live orchestral music along with their movie fun.
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