Phil Brown

A doctor's son, Brown graduated from Stanford University and joined the Group Theatre in New York in 1938. When that critically successful company folded in 1941, he relocated to Los Angeles in pursuit of film work. Together with other former Group Theatre members, he founded the Actor's Laboratory, which produced critically acclaimed works in Hollywood. There he directed plays by Arthur Miller, Nikolai Gogol, and Arthur Laurent. Though he denied being a Communist, Brown was blacklisted during the McCarthy period and in 1948 moved with his family to London, where he played opposite Helen Hayes in "The Glass Menagerie." He would live in London for 40 years.

A brief return to Hollywood in 1949 led to directing work, and two years later he completed his first feature film, "The Harlem Globetrotters," starring Dorothy Dandridge and members of the famous basketball team.

Back in London, he found work on stage and in films including "Tropic of Cancer" (1970) and "Twilight's Last Gleaming" (1977). By the mid-1970s, George Lucas was shooting interior scenes for "Star Wars" at a London sound stage and needed an actor with a strong American accent. Brown landed the role of Luke Skywalker's Uncle Owen — the most notable role of his life.