Star Wars: David Cronenberg Recalls Turning Down ‘Return of the Jedi’

After director Irvin Kershner’s success with Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, Lucasfilm sought a new filmmaker to bring the trilogy to its completion with the then-titled Star Wars: Revenge of the Jedi. Budding sci-fi director David Cronenberg was one of the many names considered to helm the third film, with the director recalling that, when he expressed disinterest in working with someone else’s material, he was essentially hung up on.

“I still recall getting a phone call,” Cronenberg shared with Entertainment Weekly. “Somebody said that they were from, I guess it was Lucasfilm, and asked me if I was interested in — at that point it was called Revenge of the Jedi, actually, until somebody pointed out that it was against Jedi philosophy to think in terms of revenge. But, anyway, I was asked if I would be interested in considering that, and meeting with everybody, and I said, with the arrogance of youth — relative youth, anyway — I said, ‘Well, I’m not used to doing other people’s material.’ And there was like a stunned silence and then ‘Click’ — hang up. Basically, that was as close as I came to that.”

Sci-fi films like The Brood and Scanners may have shown the studio the filmmaker’s potential for the galaxy far, far away, though it seems as though passing on the franchise may have been for the best, as Cronenberg has spent no time attempting to imagine what his take on the subject matter may have been.

“No, not really, because, in a way that’s like doing one episode in a well-established TV series,” Cronenberg confirmed when asked about if he conjured ideas for the potential film. “The casting is fixed of the main characters — the look of it, the tone of it, people’s expectations for it, are all fixed. You are not involved in the creating of that. And therefore you’re a little bit more like a traffic cop than you are like, for me, what a creative director can be. So that’s why it wouldn’t have interested me, really.”

The director noted that, even the best version of a genre director’s take on a familiar franchise will ultimately be just another chapter in a long-running series.

“I mean, you have Alfonso Cuarón doing a Harry Potter episode, and he did his best to try to make it stand out from the others, but basically, it’s a Harry Potter episode,” Cronenberg confessed. “And if you didn’t know that Alfonso directed it, you wouldn’t be able to tell. So, these are not attractive options for me. I mean, there’s the lure of money, and having a big budget, and having excitement around the film you’re making — but on the deep creative level, it would for me be frustrating, I think. Just frustrating.”

Cronenberg isn’t the only up-and-coming director to have been offered the gig, as Eraserhead director David Lynch was also considered for Return of the Jedi, though he passed and went on to adapt Dune.

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[H/T Entertainment Weekly]