Directing duo Phil Lord and Christopher Miller are OUT and director Ron Howard is IN for the HAN SOLO standalone Star Wars movie. Filming picks back up in mid-July and the movie, for right now, still is holding onto its Memorial Day weekend 2018 release date. Although, if it has to be pushed back you can bet Lucasfilm head Kathleen Kennedy will do just that.
There's been a lot of articles claiming to know what happened with this fallout between the two directors, Kennedy and co-writer / executive producer Lawrence Kasdan, but Entertainment Weekly has what sounds like the best round-up of information that seems true, regarding their exit.
Here's the most important bullet points from EW's report:
- Lord and Miller strayed more toward the film being a comedy than a space adventure.
- Kennedy reportedly wanted the duo to bring their "comedic touch" whereas Lord and Miller thought they could just make more of a comedy film.
- The increasing use of Lord and Miller and improv from its actors annoyed Kennedy as the movie went more and more off script; Lucasfilm felt their use of too much comedy was shifting the movie in a way which was uncomfortable as a Star Wars movie.
- The character of Han Solo was becoming increasingly more funny and less sarcastic.
- An increasing desire toward actor improv meant the movie was not following Kasdan's script as closely as he and Kennedy liked.
- There seemed to be a thought within Lucasfilm that reshoots could fix their issues but it was when they learned Lord and Miller would not use reshoots to make those changes is when things really became frayed.
- After the huge critical and financial successes of STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS and ROGUE ONE: A STAR WARS STORY, Kennedy felt her vision of Star Wars is now proven to work very, very well.
- Kasdan, as co-writer and executive producer, backed Kennedy and they became an "immovable force" for the directors and the duo was allegedly fired because of wanting things their way and not Lucsfilm's way.
- New director Ron Howard has two weeks to get to England, get on the same page, see where the movie is at and make needed adjustments before filming commences next month.
- An extended production schedule will be allowed, albeit there is still minimal time allotted due to its release timeframe next May. (Unless they change its release date at Disney's D23 Expo next month, but they better have a teaser trailer or at least images of the main actors in costume to counter the annoyance of announcing any potential delay.)
To read the entire article on EW, click right here.
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