It may seem crazy to most Star Wars fans, but director Brad Bird turned down Star Wars: The Force Awakens and it seems he had a rather good reason.
During an interview with Yahoo! Movies, the Disney director revealed that while it was a tough decision, he decided to prioritise his original feature, Tomorrowland.
“It absolutely was [a tough decision],” he said. “But there was no way to do [Star Wars] without junking this film, and we had already gotten George Clooney involved and I was excited about this film. I understand they had to get [The Force Awakens] made, and they would’ve had to push it in order for me to do it.”
Of course, it may seem like a crazy decision to walk away from the Star Wars franchise… but when it comes to directing an original, stand-alone feature film, that opportunity doesn’t come along very often in Hollywood these days.
And since he was already heavily into production, it could have jeopardised the project by putting it on pause for a while.
In a separate interview with IGN, he elaborated on his comments… and explained that unlike ‘Tomorrowland’, the upcoming ‘Star Wars’ movie was “ going to get made whether [he did] it or not”.
“I thought there’s a chance that Tomorrowland won’t get made, simply because it loses its momentum,” he said. “A movie is a weird thing. It’s not a tangible thing. You have this wispy cloud that you’re trying to solidify and I thought that it deserved to be made. You know, Star Wars is a very robust thing right now and it’s going to be fine.”
But would Bird consider returning to the galaxy far, far away?
Although he admitted that he still has plenty of love for the franchise, it seems he has his hands rather full for the foreseeable future… and it’s with another beloved property that we have been dying to see for a long, long time.
“Right now I’m writing Incredibles 2, so I’ve got my hands full!”
Star Wars: The Force Awakens heads to cinemas on 18 December 2015.
Do you Brad Bird should have taken the Star Wars VII job? ? Let us know what you think in the comments below…
