Nick Gillard

Movie stunt man and coordinator Nick Gillard, famously known as "The Swordsmaster," is best known now as the stunt coordinator for the Star Wars prequel trilogy. He had a minor role in Revenge of the Sith as Jedi Master Cin Drallig (his name spelled backward minus the k, though he is uncredited with this in the Episode III credits) and was Mark Hamill's first choice as his stunt double for Return of the Jedi.
Among Gillard's movie credits are various James Bond films, the original Star Wars, the 1989 film Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, the 1991 film Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, the 1993 film The Three Musketeers and the 1999 film Sleepy Hollow (with Ray Park). He has also performed and coordinated for Lucas' The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles television show.
==Biography==
During production of Star Wars: Episode II Attack of the Clones, animation director Rob Coleman was attempting to figure out how to create the lightsaber duel between Yoda and Count Dooku. To do this, Coleman went to Gillard who was training with the actors Hayden Christensen, Ewan McGregor, and Christopher Lee. They talked about how a combatant would fight with small weapons, and they looked at real-world examples.
As Kit Fisto's lightsaber hilt was a personal favorite of Gillard, Cin Drallig's lightsaber hilt resembles Fisto's. Based on behind-the-scenes materials, his lightsaber blade was originally to be rotoscoped in yellow. However, George Lucas would only allow either blue or green as the color of any regular Jedi's lightsaber blade, with the exception of Samuel L. Jackson's violet lightsaber blade he used as Mace Windu. Lucas would go no further with other colors, so Gillard chose green. However, a promotional image (appearing on Cin Drallig's Legends page) shows him with a blue lightsaber.
He claims to be able to speak and understand Droidspeak and is still offering Jedi training lessons similar to the ones he used to train the prequel cast as shown on his official site.
==Sources==
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*Star Wars: The Lightsaber Collection
*Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga – The Official Collector's Edition
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==Notes and references==
==External links==
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Category:Star Wars prequel trilogy production staff
Category:Star Wars: Episode III Revenge of the Sith actors
Category:Stunt performers