Ahmed Best probably popped open the champagne when he learned he’d gotten a lead role in Star Wars: The Phantom Menace. Fans had waited sixteen years for a new big-screen Star Wars adventure, George Lucas was back in the driving seat, and the 25-year-old Best was lined up to play a character that would break new grounds in CGI technology. Unfortunately for him (and us) said character was the excruciatingly annoying Jar Jar Binks.
Binks’ quasi-racist slapstick was met with instant disgust and he’s widely considered to be one of the worst characters in Star Wars. Best was clearly deeply affected by the avalanche of hatred for Binks, saying in 2018 that it got so bad he contemplated suicide:
Now, four years later, it seems Best’s “solo show” might be on the verge of happening. Saying “I think it’s time for my version of how it all went down” he posted an image of the front page:
It sounds like life was rough for Best in the years after The Phantom Menace. In 2017, he gave an interview with Wired, revealing that he’d received multiple death threats and that he received little support from Lucasfilm or his co-stars.
We’d love to hear Best’s side of the story, as we’re sure he only played Jar Jar Binks the way George Lucas asked him to. And regardless of whether anyone loves or hates a fictional character, nobody deserves to receive abuse, least of all death threats, for just doing their job.
