‘Solo: A Star Wars Story’ Writer Opens Up on Clash with Ousted Directors

At this point, the tumultuous production of Solo: A Star Wars Story is common knowledge among many fans.

Amid reported arguments with legendary screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan, directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller departed the project in mid production and were replaced by Ron Howard. Now Kasdan is opening up about the issues with the directors, revealing some insight into how the 21 Jump Street helmers’ improv approach wasn’t working for the big budget film.

“These movies are so gigantic, it is a little hard to identify exactly what moving part changes when there is a change of direction,” Kasdan told Empire Magazine. “But this movie had to go in a different direction. I’m a great believer that whatever preconceptions you have going into a movie, whatever resistance you might have, whatever excitement you may have because you’re going to see a familiar character, all bets are off about three minutes into the movie.”

Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy previously echoed a similar sentiment earlier this year when speaking with Entertainment Weekly.

“I think these guys are hilarious, but they come from a background of animation and sketch comedy and when you are making these movies you can do that and there’s plenty of room for improvisation, we do that all the time,” Kennedy said. “But it has to be inside of a highly structured process or you can’t get the work done and you can’t move the armies of people to anticipate and have things ready. So, it literally came down to process. Just getting it done.”

Lord spoke for his partner on the project and said there was no ill will harbored toward anyone involved with the production, and chalked it up to an unfortunate circumstance.

“Sometimes people break up, and it’s really sad, and it’s really disappointing, but it happens and we learned a lot from our collaborators and we’re better filmmakers for it,” Lord said. “We’re really proud of the work we did on the movie and we wish everybody the best.”

Howard will be receiving sole director credit for his work on Solo, while Lord and Miller will be designated as executive producers. Howard iterated to Empire that he doesn’t want people to consider who did what work on the movie.

“Look, I don’t want to go into it too much because I really don’t want people worrying about how many people worked on the movie,” Howard said about splitting the work with Lord and Miller. “I just think the movie will speak for itself. And these stories are meant to be immersive, something you can lose yourself in.”

Solo: A Star Wars Story premieres in theaters on May 25th.

Are you excited for the new Star Wars movie? Be sure to let us know in the comment section!

[h/t CBM]