In Lucasfilm’s Star Wars: The Last Jedi, the Skywalker saga continues as the heroes of The Force Awakens join the galactic legends in an epic adventure that unlocks age-old mysteries of the Force and shocking revelations of the past.
Recently the cast of The Last Jedi came together in a secret location for a press conference, to talk about the making of the film and to share teases (but no spoilers) about the newest chapter in the saga.
The question of the cast was asked: How would you say this film feels different from The Force Awakens? What sets it apart from that film?
Director Rian Johnson kicked off the Press Conference by saying, “This is very, very exciting. So yeah, it’s a second movie in the trilogy and I think we’ve been kind of trained to expect it’ll be a little darker and obviously it looks a little darker and the thing is though for me I loved the tone of the original films and also that J.J. captured in The Force Awakens of fun, and that’s like to me it’s a Star Wars movie, you know, first and foremost we were trying to make it feel like a Star Wars movie.”
He continued by saying, “That means you have the intensity and you’ve got the opera, but it also means that it makes you come out of the theater wanting to run in your backyard, grab your spaceship toys and make them fly around, you know, and that’s a key ingredient to it. So we’re going to go to some intense places in the movie but I hope also it’s fun, it’s funny. I don’t know, you’ve seen it.”
Mark Hamill decided to throw in a funny comment, “My answer will be in direct proportion to the amount of screen time I have.”
Daisy Ridley added, “I mean, the biggest thing for me when I read the script, because you know, even though you’re trying to avoid what people are saying, it’s hard to, and because people responded well to John and me as a team, I was a bit nervous about not being a team so much in this one. So I think for me personally it was a challenge. The film was a challenge and I don’t know what it was like for anyone else, but to be in different combinations of people. So in itself, we’re in different situations, we’re with different people that we are learning about, we’re meeting for the first time, so yeah, felt pretty different for me.”
Press: I want to ask Domhnall and Adam about your two characters. Hux and Kylo Ren had a really interesting relationship in The Force Awakens that I understand is expanded on in this movie, where Snoke sort of plays them against each other, they’re allies but not really. I wondered if you two could talk about their bond or lack thereof, as we enter this film.
Adam Driver responded, “I think definitely there’s a competition and it’s maybe yet to be discovered where that comes from. If anything, I think that’s more of a testament to kind of what everyone has been saying of Rian’s inability to not mind a character in every moment, which seems like an obvious thing, but he doesn’t so he knows that spectacle, it won’t mean anything if you don’t care about anything that’s going on, which again, seems very obvious but I think it’s a really hard thing to balance with this many moving parts in the scale of something like this”. Driver continued by saying, “So I love playing those scenes, especially with Domhnall, ‘cause he’s a great actor and there’s nothing is kind of taken for granted where, you know, oh, this happens and it moves on. If anything, Rian slows the pace and there’s not a moment that’s taken for granted. It’s always broken up into little pieces and the story in our mind comes first before an explosion.”
Domhnall added, “I don’t know. I think it’s funny, you know, like there’s just such a huge amount of drama going on in that group of people but then also just a huge amount of bitchy infighting as well, which I think is really fun to see them kind of really hurt each other from the inside as well as from the outside, you know, the united front thing is difficult for them sometimes. But it was just – yeah, I’m not good – sorry, I think, it’s such a privilege to be in the film.”
Towards the end of the press conference, a question was asked about the legacy of Leia and Carrie. “I don’t think I can really follow that, except to just say Carrie’s daughter Billie is I think all of those qualities. She’s smart and funny and shameless and wonderful”, commented Ridley.
“Yeah, I mean, I agree with everything that was said. I think that something about Carrie that I really look up to is, and something I didn’t realize until recently, was just how much courage it takes to truly be yourself when you’re on a public platform or when possibly a lot of people will be looking at you, and she was so unapologetic and so openly herself and that is something that I am really trying to do, and it’s hard. And just like Daisy said, like Laura said, like Gwendoline said, I think that she will always be an icon as Leia but also as Carrie. What an example, you know? And I am so fortunate to have met her and I think that she will really live on forever”, said Kelly Marie Tran.
The film stars Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, Adam Driver, Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, Oscar Isaac, Lupita Nyong’o, Andy Serkis, Domhnall Gleeson, Anthony Daniels, Gwendoline Christie, Kelly Marie Tran, Laura Dern and Benicio Del Toro.
Star Wars: The Last Jedi is written and directed by Rian Johnson and produced by Kathleen Kennedy and Ram Bergman. J.J. Abrams, Tom Karnowski, and Jason McGatlin are the executive producers.
Star Wars: The Last Jedi opens in U.S. theaters on December 15, 2017.
