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Holy shit, there’s a new Star Wars movie coming out this week. Seriously, how excited is everyone? As excited as this guy? Didn’t think so. Anyway, as you line up Thursday to see The Force Awakens, you may want to pay close attention to the cosplayers around you: Someone from the National Cathedral will be at the Uptown Theater and AMC Loews Georgetown in full Darth Vader regalia giving out cards with a chance to win a “private gargoyle tower climb at the Cathedral.”
It may seem like an odd sort of event—and promotion—for the National Cathedral, in case you forgot, Darth Vader is actually a part of the Cathedral. As the story goes, when the Cathedral’s west towers were being built in the ’80s, they held a sculpture competition for children. With hundreds of drawings submitted, three were selected to be turned into a sculpture on the towers: a raccoon, the head of a girl with pigtails and braces, and the head of Darth Vader, which was sculpted by Jay Hall Carpenter and carved by Patrick J. Plunkett.
Anyway, an unspecified number winners of the contest will get a 90-minute “gargoyle tower climb” on the Cathedral’s two west towers for up to five people, which will feature “a close-up look at many gargoyles and grotesques,” a release states. And, of course, a close-up look at Vader.