We picked up Sketchfest’s biggest ‘Star Wars’ nerds at SFO and took them to meet Yoda

Of all the nerds who descend on San Francisco for Sketchfest — the city’s premier comedy festival, wrapping up this weekend — perhaps none have spent more time obsessing over “Star Wars” than Patrick Cotnoir and Connor Ratliff of “The George Lucas Talk Show,” a loving spoof of the sci-fi director that runs at New York’s Upright Citizens Brigade. 

“Since 2020, we’ve done about 500 hours,” Cotnoir, the show’s producer, said from the front seat of the SUV after I picked him up at SFO. “And then we had done 75 or 80 shows pre-Covid.” 

When you add up all the “Star Wars” content out there — 11 feature films, seven live-action television series, and plenty of animation — it wouldn’t come close to that staggering total. So even a devoted geek might be intimidated to give these two a lift from the airport to their Airbnb in Marin County for an in-transit interview ahead of their festival appearances.

It would be great to say The Standard blasted our way out of Mos Eisley spaceport’s Docking Bay 94 in the Millennium Falcon, evaded two Imperial Star Destroyers, and entered hyperspace. Instead, we borrowed a colleague’s Acura, met them at Terminal 2, and sat in traffic on the 101. 

The destination? San Anselmo — very close to George Lucas’ house — but first, I kidnapped them to make a detour to a certain Jedi holy shrine to say hello to a diminutive elder who speaks in a riddle-studded syntax. Yoda that would be, who is honored with a fountain at Lucasfilm in the Presidio.

Naturally, they figured out the destination. “Just keep going straight,” Cotnoir said at a stop near the Lucasfilm Games campus. “It’s up there.”

Cotnoir and Ratliff — latter hosts “The George Lucas Talk Show” but is best known for his mordantly self-deprecating podcast “Dead Eyes” — are such intense “Star Wars” fans that even their Sketchfest show is an ironic deep cut.  On Saturday they will do a parody live reading of one of the most reviled pieces of the canon, the 1978 holiday special, which aired on CBS only once, at the peak of “Star Wars” mania. A bizarre, sluggishly paced dud, it’s known for recycled footage from the original 1977 film, cameos by TV stars like Bea Arthur, and a highly praised animated sequence that introduces the bounty hunter Boba Fett. The program is so reviled that in an interview, Lucas once vowed to destroy every copy in existence. But thanks to the internet, it’s available to watch in full on YouTube.

In other words, the holiday special is a nerd’s dream, a surreal, seldom-seen piece of bonus content that feels like any other cheesy ’70s television special — but with Luke Skywalker, C-3PO, and Princess Leia reprising her cinnamon-bun hairstyle. “I love a lot of that special because it’s so weird,” Cotnoir said. “It’s wild that there are 20 more minutes of Han Solo out there.”

Cotnoir will narrate the live reading Sunday at Cobb’s Comedy Club, while Ratliff will take on the role of a Rebel trader originally played by veteran actor Art Carney. Various elements, like Arthur’s torch song in the famous cantina, will be played by special guests. (One is a contestant on “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” but they wouldn’t divulge who.)

As with “The George Lucas Talk Show” — coming back to Sketchfest Saturday at Club Fugazi, along with another, non-“Star Wars” project — the live reading is meant to be a goofy, unscripted riff on a half-forgotten pop-culture artifact that everyone can enjoy, not a parade of obscure trivia for the diehards. 

“I am always more interested in the stuff that’s a little bit around the corner from ‘Star Wars’ than I am the actual ‘Star Wars’ stuff,” Ratliff said. “Every now and then, we’ll get back into it for comedic purposes. But a lot of that’s very sort of well-trod territory.”

Guests on “The George Lucas Talk Show” have ranged from established actors like Bebe Neuwirth, who may know very little about, say, “The Empire Strikes Back,” to people who performed technical jobs on the set of that 1980 film. 

But what about Lucas himself? As we drove through the posh Marin neighborhood where the now-retired director lives, the two admitted that they’ve tried.

“Every year, they get back to us, and they’re very nice. Like, ‘He’s just busy right now, but please keep asking,’” Ratliff recalled. “And we’d love to have Mark Hamill on the show and never talk about ‘Star Wars.’”

We considered knocking on Lucas’ house, but everyone was hungry and tired and ready to head to the cantina for a glass of blue milk.