Three things pop in Scott Dadich‘s Wired interview with Star Wars: The Force Awakens director J.J. Abrams. One, Dadich has used the word “pressure” and more specifically the phrase “No pressure, right?” And that means Dadich is a dead man as I really and truly hate journalists who ask “so how much pressure was it to nail this given the huge expectations?” (I explained why on 9.24.14.) Two, the top-of-the-page photo of Abrams is possibly the coolest ever taken of the guy, ever. And three, a passage in which Abrams talks about working with Episode VIII director Rian Johnson (i.e., another special friend-of-HE) is interesting. Here it is:
“The script for VIII is written. I’m sure rewrites are going to be endless, like they always are. But what Larry [Kasdan] and I did was set up certain key relationships, certain key questions, conflicts. And we knew where certain things were going. We had meetings with Rian and Ram Bergman, the producer of VIII. They were watching dailies when we were shooting our movie. We wanted them to be part of the process, to make the transition to their film as seamless as possible. I showed Rian an early cut of the movie, because I knew he was doing his rewrite and prepping. And as executive producer of VIII, I need that movie to be really good. Withholding serves no one and certainly not the fans. So we’ve been as transparent as possible.
“Rian has asked for a couple of things here and there that he needs for his story. He is an incredibly accomplished filmmaker and an incredibly strong writer. So the story he told took what we were doing and went in the direction that he felt was best but that is very much in line with what we were thinking as well. But you’re right — that will be his movie; he’s going to do it in the way he sees fit. He’s neither asking for nor does he need me to oversee the process.”
I have to be honest — this quote from Abrams about Episode VII scared the living shit out of me. A really good movie can delightful, of course. Spotlight is delightful; so are Brooklyn, Mad Max: Fury Road and Zero Dark Thirty. But what are the odds of a movie being delightful if you start making it with a determination to make it fucking “delightful”?
