Mark Hamill

For millions of people, Mark Hamill is Luke Skywalker, the farm boy who became a Jedi. For millions of others, he is the Joker, the cackling villain he voiced for more than two decades in Batman: The Animated Series and the Arkham video games. That the same man is the face of pure-hearted heroism and the voice of gleeful menace is the central surprise of his career.

He was born on September 25, 1951, in Oakland, California, at 2:43 in the afternoon, as his birth certificate shows. His Sun is at the very start of Libra, in the ninth house, alongside Saturn and Neptune, also in Libra. Libra is idealistic and drawn to questions of balance and justice, and the ninth house concerns faraway places, belief systems and epic journeys. A Libra Sun in the ninth with Neptune nearby fits a man whose most famous role was a seeker on a mythic quest in a galaxy far, far away.

But the darker side of his talent shows up in the eighth house, the area of a chart associated with shadow, intensity and transformation. Mercury and Venus in Virgo fall there, along with Mars and Pluto in Leo. Mercury governs the voice and speech, and Pluto in the eighth is associated with darkness and power. It would be hard to design a better astrological signature for the actor who gave the Joker his laugh.

Capricorn is his rising sign, a sign of discipline and endurance. Hamill grew up in a Navy family, one of seven children, moving constantly; he attended high school in Japan near the naval base at Yokosuka. He began his career in television and voice work, including a regular role on General Hospital, before George Lucas cast him in Star Wars, which opened in 1977.

In January 1977, months before Star Wars opened, he was badly injured in a car accident that required facial reconstructive surgery. He returned for The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, then deliberately turned toward the stage, playing Mozart in Amadeus on Broadway and appearing in The Elephant Man.

His Moon is in Leo at the earliest degree of the sign, in the seventh house, which governs partnership. A Leo Moon is warm, loyal and generous, and in the seventh it suggests emotional security found in a stable partnership. Hamill married Marilou York in 1978, and they have been together ever since, a rarity in Hollywood.

Jupiter, retrograde in Aries, lies in his third house of communication, a placement associated with enthusiasm and openness in conversation. Hamill is known for his warmth with fans, his playful social media presence and his habit of signing autographs and sharing behind-the-scenes stories for hours.

In 1992 he began voicing the Joker, and he went on to play hundreds of animated roles. He returned as an older, disillusioned Luke in The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi, and in 2018 he received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. The Libra hero and the eighth-house villain have shared the same voice for nearly half a century.