What started out as a bad pun has become an unofficial holiday for Star Wars fans.
“May the 4th be with you” is the thing to say on the fourth day of May or, as it’s also known, Star Wars Day.
A day when people want to celebrate the popular movie franchise, and that makes it a busy day for Ottawa’s Capital City Garrison – 501st Legion. It is an organization of dedicated, hard-core fans who make appearances in their movie-accurate Star Wars costumes. “We get a lot of requests for events,” says the group’s Commanding Officer, and a very convincing Stormtrooper, Geoff Buck. “Anywhere we go there are Star Wars fans. It’s just that today is a little bit more special because a lot more people are thinking about it.”
Several members of the group, including Princess Leia, Darth Vader, a few Stormtroopers and even an Imperial Guard, greeted customers at the Indigo book store in Barrhaven for a couple of hours in the afternoon. “It was really cool,” says 12-year-old Jordan Weiserod. “Star Wars is cool, and to see the characters in real life instead of just on the screen is really awesome.”
And that wasn’t the only place celebrating Star Wars on this day. If you were near Parliament Hill at the noon hour you would have heard parts of John Williams’ famous soundtrack, adapted for and performed on the Peace Tower carillon. It’s become something of an annual tradition for Parliament’s official carilloneur, Dr. Andrea McCrady.
Michael Parker is a Star Wars fan who comes to listen every May the 4th. “Every year at 12 o’clock. Yeah, it’s a good time,” he says.
If you missed it, there’s always next year.
Just don’t look for any Star Wars frivolity the day after May the 4th.
That’s known, rather ominously, as “Revenge of the Fifth.”
