Lucas revealed that the different audio tracks for the movie had very specific and slightly sterile names. For example, Murch at one point wanted Lucas to hand him Reel 2, Dialog 2. Instead of saying the whole name out loud, though, the editor shortened the whole thing, asking Lucas “to get R2D2.”

Immediately, George Lucas was struck by what a great name that would make for one of his future stories. He immediately wrote it down and kept the memorable name in mind. When he began working on Star Wars and needed a name for the movie’s most iconic droid (sorry, Threepio), he named him “R2-D2” based on this moment during the production of American Graffiti.