The past month has seen the losses of some of Industrial Light and Magic’s unsung heroes – special effects supervisor Brian Johnson and stage technician/key grip Dick Dova Spah. The two ILM alumni worked together on the likes of the Star Wars films The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, and The Phantom Menace.
Brian Johnson was a visual effects artist whose credits include 2001: A Space Odyssey, the original Alien, The Pirates of Penzance, and DragonHeart, along with being involved with several episodes of the puppet-based action series Thunderbirds. Johnson found a breakthrough hit as a supervisor with the ILM production The Empire Strikes Back before going on to supervise other iconic fantasy and sci-fi films in the 1980s, such as Dragonslayer, The NeverEnding Story, and Aliens, along with the cult classic Slipstream (which featured Mark Hamill in a rare live-action villain role and was produced by Gary Kurtz, who produced both A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back). Johnson received recognition by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for his work on The Empire Strikes Back and Aliens with two Oscar wins. Johnson lived to be 86 years old.
Dick Dovah Spah has an interesting life story as well. Surviving the Hindenburg disaster at the age of 1 thanks to the skills of his acrobat father (who also saved his wife in the process of saving his son), Spah would grow up to become a key grip in the 1970s and work behind the scenes, with some of his general credits including the 1978 remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Explorers, Batteries Not Included, Back to the Future Part III, The Rocketeer, Hook, The Mask, James and the Giant Peach, the first Scream, The Lost World: Jurassic Park, and Men in Black. Spah worked on the three aforementioned Star Wars movies as a key grip, a standard grip, and a stage technician. Other Lucasfilm productions that Spah were involved with were Raiders of the Lost Ark, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Howard the Duck, Tucker: A Man and His Dream, and Willow; in terms of additional work with ILM, he also worked on Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, Star Trek: Generations, Dragonslayer, Poltergeist, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Starman, Die Hard 2, Backdraft, and Congo. Spah lived to be 90 years old.
You can read ILM’s official statements on their passings below:
Our ILM community was deeply saddened at the loss of Brian Johnson. We collaborated with the special effects supervisor on Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, Dragonslayer, and years later, Dragonheart. We celebrate Brian’s masterful work in the art of cinema, which also included… pic.twitter.com/hzqpQtTNcU
— Industrial Light & Magic (@ILMVFX) June 17, 2026
The ILM community mourns the loss of our former colleague Dick Dova Spah. For those who worked at ILM in the 1980s and ’90s, he was simply known as “Dickie,” and was one of the company’s inimitable stagehands and key grips. Coming to ILM out of the San Francisco theatrical scene… pic.twitter.com/he8IhB2c3M
— Industrial Light & Magic (@ILMVFX) July 1, 2026
They will be missed. We send our condolences to all of their family and loved ones.
Grant has been a fan of Star Wars for as long as he can remember, having seen every movie on the big screen. When he’s not hard at work with his college studies, he keeps himself busy by reporting on all kinds of Star Wars news for SWNN and general movie news on the sister site, Movie News Net. He served as a frequent commentator on SWNN’s The Resistance Broadcast.