Chalmun's Spaceport Cantina

Chalmun's Spaceport Cantina was a sandstone construct originally built as a fortress to defend against Tusken Raider raids. It was located on Inner Curved Street in the outskirts of the Mos Eisley spaceport on Tatooine. The building housed a bar area with a maximum occupancy of 102 patrons, and had twelve drinks available on tap, with the size of a standard drink being 16 ounces. The most popular drinks at the cantina were blue milk, Tatooine Sunset, Jawa Juice, Yatooni Boska, Tatooni Junko, and Hutt's Delight. There was also a secret drinks list that patrons could ask for, which included the items Red Dwarf, Cassandra Sunrise, Nova Blaster, and Flameout. The Bith "Fiery" Figrin D'an, kloo horn player and leader of the Modal Nodes, was a regular act at Chalmun's Cantina.

Frequent clients were privy to a number of special accommodations that could be requested from the owners. If a patron were to ask for the Nova Blaster with Savareen Brandy swapped for Corellian, the patron would then be escorted into a hidden gun closet where they could purchase black market weapons. Patrons could also pay a significant fee to be allowed into a back room, where they were afforded privacy -both from the bar's security and other clients. There was also a signal jammer hidden behind the building to afford extra privacy.

Other than the public bar, the building housed a private bar, staffed by Nimbanel barman Husklf and reserved exclusively for the owner, Chalmun and the occasional celebrity or Hutt affiliate visitor. The Wookiee also kept an office behind the private bar, where he arranged business with the bartenders and observed the main lounge from behind a secret surveillance window. Chalmun's security chief used the back of the office to listen in to the patrons' private conversations for any signs of trouble. Aware of his clientele's nefarious activities, Chalmun turned one of the back rooms into an open-air hangar where he stored his escape craft, tended to by his personal pilot.

On the cellar of the Cantina was a laboratory where Wuher prepared the special drinks that were then routed via a buried pipe into the bar dispensers. Behind the lab was a caustic pit where unwanted items (and occasionally bodies) were dumped, as well as ancient catacombs that predated the building's construction.

The Cantina was originally constructed by early Tatooine pioneers as a fortification against Sand People raids. As Mos Eisley expanded, the building saw use as an armory, a brewery and a flophouse for vagrants. Eventually, it was purchased by the Vriichon brothers, who turned it into an illegal spice den.

Sometime before the Clone Wars, the building was purchased by the Wookiee Chalmun, who legitimized the business by turning it into a bar for spacers arriving into the busy spaceport of Mos Eisley. Over time, it became a successfull landmark of Tatooine, with many coming to the planet to pursue connections in the establishment.

During the Blockade of Pantora, the seedy bar, at this point run by a Nimbanel bartender, was a known haven for criminals and lowlifes, many under the employ of Jabba the Hutt. Greedo, a bounty hunter hired by Trade Federation official Sib Canay, kidnapped Che Amanwe Papanoida, the daughter of Pantoran Supreme Chairman Notluwiski Papanoida, and held her captive in one of the cantina's back rooms. When Greedo was forced by Jabba to lead the Chairman Papanoida and his son Ion to the cantina, a firefight broke out in the bar between the three Pantorans and Greedo's associates.

Around the time of the Battle of Kadavo during the Clone Wars, two Alderaanian tourists visiting Tatooine died in a speeder bike accident. The Zygerrian News implied that the two had gotten intoxicated in the cantina of Mos Eisley, thereby causing the accident.

Following the Battle of Dathomir, Asajj Ventress made her way to the Mos Eisley cantina, where she began to drown her sorrows with prow. One of the patrons, a bounty hunter named Oked, made a pass at her, and when he refused to relent, was killed by Ventress. Two other bounty hunters, Bossk and Latts Razzi, coerced Ventress into joining their job in Oked's place.

Soon after, Ventress and Razzi were in the cantina when Ventress felt a disturbance in the Force, that disturbance being Savage Opress coming closer to locating his brother, Maul.

Once Opress had found Maul, the two began a killing spree in order to draw out Maul's nemesis Obi-Wan Kenobi. Opress appeared on a screen displaying open bounties, prompting Ventress to take the job in an attempt to take down her former underling.

Following the mission to Raxus Secundus, Ventress returned to Tatooine to enlist Boba Fett's Syndicate to help her rescue Jedi Master Quinlan Vos from Serenno. She met with Boba Fett in the cantina, and after some debating, the two joined forces to free Vos.

By the time of the Galactic Civil War, the cantina had changed ownership twice since the Clone Wars: the Ranat siblings known as the Vriichon brothers turned the building into an illegal spice den, until the Wookiee Chalmun turned it back into a bar. Under his employ was the gruff human Wuher, who, despite not being the friendliest bartender in the galaxy, was respected by his customers for never asking any questions, and Ackmena, the female night-shift bartender, who had friendlier manners.

Kenobi and Luke Skywalker came to the cantina shortly before the destruction of Alderaan to charter a course to the doomed planet, in order to deliver technical readouts on the Empire's Death Star. After having their droids tossed out due to the cantina's no-droid policy, they hired the smuggler Han Solo and his compatriot Chewbacca, who needed a way to pay off their debt to Jabba the Hutt. Their visit was not uneventful; the Jedi Master and his apprentice were harassed and confronted by Doctor Cornelius Evazan and his thug Ponda Baba, the latter of whom lost his arm after provoking Kenobi. Afterwards, Solo had an altercation with the bounty hunter Greedo, who was eager to collect the bounty on Solo. Solo, however, killed him with a single shot after Greedo foolishly fired first—and missed. Han then tossed Wuher some credits and left the cantina to prep the Millennium Falcon for the two fugitives.

Shortly after the Battle of Yavin, Darth Vader employed Fett to track down and capture the mysterious pilot who destroyed the Death Star. Knowing that Solo frequented Mos Eisley, the bounty hunter would interrogate and promptly murder his victims after they failed to provide any sufficient leads. Entering the Mos Eisley Cantina, Boba Fett addressed the gathered crowd that he would not leave until he was provided the information he sought. After brutally wounding a six-armed alien and intimidating the bar patrons, Wuher responded that no one knew the boy, and that he had only come in some time ago with Kenobi. After shooting a length of fibercord and causing a fleeing patron to fall down, the teen soon broke down and told Boba the boy's name—Luke Skywalker. He then shot the boy and headed towards Ben Kenobi's home in order to discover more about Luke's identity. Unbeknownst to Boba, his discovery of Skywalker's name at Chalmun's Cantina would soon allow Darth Vader to realize that he had a son.

By 9 ABY, after the fall of the Empire, the cantina was under a new boss, and the no-droid policy was abolished. Multiple supervisor droids served as the new bartenders. When bounty hunter Din Djarin visited the cantina looking for work, one of the droid bartenders, EV-9D9, stated that the Bounty Hunters' Guild no longer operated from Tatooine. He clarified that he operated separately from the Guild, but the droid replied stating that no work was available. Djarin was immediately greeted by rookie bounty hunter Toro Calican, who teamed up with him to hunt down the assassin Fennec Shand.

Crew members playing Bith musicians in the cantina moved to the beat of Benny Goodman's 1937 hit song "Sing, Sing, Sing" while filming on set.

If one looks closely at the bar behind Wuher, one can see surplus jet engine parts that were later used for the head of bounty hunter droid IG-88.

Filming for the cantina exteriors in A New Hope took place in Ajim, Djerba, Tunisia on April 2–3, 1976. However, most of the interior shots were from Stage 6 at Elstree Studios on April 13–21.

Chalmun's Cantina was the same cantina in the now non-canonical The Star Wars Holiday Special, set months after A New Hope, and shown during a night shift.

A skit on a 1977 episode of The Richard Pryor Show took place in the "Star Wars Bar," with Pryor playing the bartender. Though the skit did not reuse the original sets, many of the masks from A New Hopes cantina scene were used for the patrons.

The cantina was featured in an official 1979 drunk-driving PSA. In 2007, the official site made it available for viewing.

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