This morning, along with the new trailer and poster for the upcoming Disney+ live-action series Star Wars: Skeleton Crew, Lucasfilm shared an in-depth interview with the series’ creators and showrunners Jon Watts and Christopher Ford (who previously collaborated on 2017’s Spider-Man: Homecoming for Marvel Studios) via the official Star Wars website. Below is my brief recap of what these two filmmakers shared with StarWars.com Editor-In-Chief Kristin Baver during their chat.
- Jon Watts sought advice from The Goonies director Richard Donner on how to cast children for the series, which was largely inspired by the 1985 adventure/comedy film.
- Watts and Chris Ford also sought inspiration from LucasArts’ beloved Monkey Island series of adventure games, Steven Spielberg’s E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial and Empire of the Sun, John McTiernan’s Predator, Disney’s Flight of the Navigator, and Lucasfilm’s Indiana Jones franchise.
- The idea for Star Wars: Skeleton Crew was conceived of prior to the release of Spider-Man: Homecoming.
- Watts and Ford confirm that Teek from Ewoks: The Battle for Endor makes an appearance and that the blue elephant-like character of Neel is not the same species (Ortolan) as Max Rebo from Jabba’s Palace in Return of the Jedi.
- The showrunners talk about the casting of each individual child actor for the show, and what characteristics they were looking for in each role.
- Neel was created using “a combination of facial motion capture, a suit performer, and an animatronic puppeteered head” and the actor Robert Timothy Smith was able to improvise as the character.
Image via StarWars.com
- Star Jude Law is confirmed to be “a giant Star Wars fan.”
- Much of actor Nick Frost’s dialogue for the droid SM-33 was pre-recorded so the rest of the cast could hear him talking on-set.
- The creators talked with executive producers Dave Filoni and Jon Favreau, then revisited the media that inspired George Lucas’s original vision for Star Wars for further inspiration.
- Addressing the suburban planet seen in the trailer, Watts says that it was important to show “that the galaxy is also peaceful and boring.”
- In addition to taking place during the same New Republic time period as The Mandalorian, The Book of Boba Fett, and Ahsoka, Skeleton Crew will be filled with “nods to deep corners of Star Wars storytelling,” but “you don’t have to know anything” to enjoy the ride.
Star Wars: Skeleton Crew will debut with a two-episode premiere on Tuesday, December 3rd, exclusively via Disney+. Visit StarWars.com to read Kristin Baver’s full interview with Jon Watts and Chris Ford.
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