By George Bate
The HoloFiles recently had the opportunity to attend a press conference for the new Willow series on Disney+. Executive producer and series creator Jon Kasdan spoke at length about the development of the revival of the 1980s fantasy classic, but also provided some interesting details about George Lucas’ set visit to Solo: A Star Wars Story.
With his father Lawrence Kasdan, Jon Kasdan co-wrote Solo: A Star Wars Story, a film that yielded disappointing box office results upon release, but is well regarded among Star Wars faithful. Regarding Lucas’ visit to the Solo set and the conversations they had about Willow, Kasdan said, “[George Lucas] came and visited the set of Solo because he is devoted to Ron [Howard], and they are dear, dear friends in real life. And they told us sort of that he was going to come for just a moment, and we shouldn’t make direct eye contact or ask him any direct questions, and instead he ended up staying for six hours and answering all our questions, and being nothing but lovely.”
For die hard Star Wars fans, it’s touching to see the creator himself George Lucas still take in an interest in the direction of the franchise.
Kasdan took the opportunity to ask Lucas about the opportunities for more Willow stories.
“I sort of said to him in this moment when I found myself sitting next to this God of my childhood, you know, the one thing I thought that Lucasfilm really had an opportunity to do was to tell more Willow stories. And he kind of smiled wryly and said he couldn’t agree more, and had been trying to make that happen for quite a while.”
The first two episodes of the new Willow series are streaming now on Disney+.