Taika Waititi Shares New Update On His 'Star Wars' Movie
By Kristin Myers on September 15, 2023 at 10:00 AM EDT
Director Taika Waititi does not have good news to share about his "Star Wars" movie.
Although the movie was first announced by Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy in 2020, very little progress has been made on the film since that time. It appears that the Marvel director still does not have a script completed, and it looks like he isn't going to make any progress on it during the WGA writer's strike.
Taika Waititi Admits His 'Star Wars' Script Still Isn't Done Amid Writer's Strike
Taika Waititi was in attendance at the Toronto International Film Festival Tribute Awards to honor "Free Guy" director Shawn Levy with the inaugural Norman Jewison Career Achievement Award. At the event, Levy gave an update on his own "Star Wars" movie, telling Collider, “We were just starting the process of developing my movie, and the writer strike happened. So we are in that holding pattern that so much of our industry is in.”
According to Variety, Waititi also revealed that his project was on hiatus and that his script had not been completed. “Unlike me, let’s hope he manages to finish a script for that,” Waititi joked.
Taika Waitti Seems To Be Stuck On The 'Middle Part'
The last time that Taika Waititi gave an update on his highly anticipated “Star Wars” movie was in May 2023, when he told The Hollywood Reporter that he had a “really good idea” for his film, but that he was stuck on the “middle part.”
“I’ve got a really good idea for it,” he said. “It’s just as with all films, it’s this middle part. You’re like, ‘What’s going to happen?’ And then you look at all of those films that are so great, you’re like, ‘Well, I guess they can’t meet some smuggler with an alien sidekick.'”
Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy Praises His 'Unique Voice'
A month before, Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy told Variety at the Star Wars Celebration fan event in London that the director was “still working away” on the movie.
“He’s writing the script himself,” Kennedy said. “He doesn’t really want to bring others into that process and I don’t blame him. He has a very, very unique voice. So we want to protect that and that’s what he’s doing. But we’re going to make that one day.”
Progress On His ‘Star Wars’ Film Has Been Slow
In July 2022, over a year ago, Waititi told /Film that the film was still in the early stages of development. “At the moment it’s just very early, because I … still haven’t even finished the script,” he explained. “I’m still trying to come up with ideas and I’m mostly kind of in that part of the process where it’s still very kind of open.”
“And when I write, I kind of write every idea I’ve ever had and then start to kind of chisel it down into something,” he continued. “But I’m still throwing everything at the wall right now.”
In a follow-up interview with Total Film, he revealed that he wanted to introduce new characters to “expand” the franchise.
“Look, I think for the Star Wars universe to expand, it has to expand,” Waititi said. “I don’t think that I’m any use in the Star Wars universe making a film where everyone’s like, ‘Oh great, well that’s the blueprints to the Millennium Falcon, ah that’s Chewbacca’s grandmother.’”
“That all stands alone, that’s great, though I would like to take something new and create some new characters and just expand the world, otherwise it feels like it’s a very small story,” he added.
However, in another 2022 interview with The Wrap, he replied, “Not this year” when asked if he was hard at work on the film.
“I’m going to be in New Zealand from August until the end of the year with ‘Our Flag Means Death’ and ‘Time Bandits’ and during that time I will still be writing,” he explained at the time, adding, “I’m still trying to figure out what the story is.”
In another interview with the New York Times, Waititi expressed doubt that his “Star Wars” movie will get made even if he does finish the script. “I’m trying to write the ‘Star Wars’ idea at the moment,” he explained. “I’ve got to see how that goes, because once I submit it, that might determine when it gets made or if it gets made, even.”
In March 2023, he told Variety that he would like to star on his own “Star Wars” movie. The publication reported that Waititi “continues to work” on his “Star Wars” script and will “most likely have a part in it as well.”
Taika Waititi’s own “Star Wars” movie was first announced on May 4, 2020, when Lucasfilm announced that he would co-write a new Star Wars movie alongside “Last Night in Soho” writer Krysty Wilson-Cairns.
It looks like Wilson-Cairns has left the creative process and Taika Waititi is now working on the script by himself.
