Hossein Amini, who is working on the upcoming Star Wars series centered on Ewan McGregor’s Obi-Wan Kenobi confirms that the project morphed from a film into a series for Disney+.
In an recent interview with Discussint Film, Amini confirmed that he was circling the new Obi-Wan Kenobi project when it was going to be a theatrical film directed by Stephen Daldry (Billy Elliot). Amini revealed how he ended up working on the Obi-Wan Kenobi Star Wars series:
“I was initially contacted by the original director for the film version, Stephen Daldry and chatted with him and loved him as a director and then with Lucasfilm, it was more of a conversation than a pitch, I am incredibly gracious about it. They didn’t make it feel like an audition.”
Amini also explained why he thinks a television series format works better for this new Obi-Wan Kenobi project rather than original plans for a Star Wars Story film:
“I think because of what we were speaking about before, the situation is so complex both for him personally and in a way, the state of the galaxy, you sort of need time to explore it and to be honest there are loads of other stories within that period as well, it’s quite a few years. There is so much going on between episode 3 and 4 that hasn’t been explored. The idea of being able to go into a character journey plus the politics and plus all the vastness of the empire and what’s going on is exciting just because it feels like a proper period of history and sometimes that is hard to do in two hours. Sometimes with two-hour movies there is always an imperative for the action and the plot to move particularly fast and quickly and to go from action sequence to action sequence and there are many more aspects to storytelling that I find interesting.”
Based on Amini’s comments, it appears that the format of television serves to develop stories and characters better than the traditional film model given there are more hours of content through a series format rather than just a standalone film. Perhaps this will benefit Obi-Wan Kenobi’s arc in the long run.
Are you excited to see Ewan McGregor reprise his role as Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars again after all these years? Sound off in the comments below.
Disney’s Obi-Wan Kenobi series featuring Ewan McGregor will be the mouse house’s third live-action Star Wars series for Disney Plus. First up is The Mandalorian which will feature Pedro Pascal as a lone gunslinger after the events of Star Wars: Return of the Jedi. The series, which hails from Jon Favreau, also stars Gina Carano, Giancarlo Esposito, Emily Swallow, Carl Weathers, Omid Abtahi, Werner Herzog, and Nick Nolte. The Mandalorian premieres November 12 on Disney Plus.
Following The Mandalorian, Diego Luna will reprise his Rogue One: A Star Wars Story role as Cassian Andor in a prequel series which will follow the Rebel spy working as an intelligence operative during the formative years of the Rebel Alliance. Stephen Schiff (The Americans) is serving as showrunner. Production on the project is set to begin next year after the actor completes his work on the second season of Narcos: Mexico.
Be sure to continue following Heroic Hollywood for all the latest news on the upcoming Obi-Wan Kenobi series and the future of the Star Wars franchise.
Source: Discussing Film
