StarWars.com’s Kristin Baver talks to director Jon Favreau about the upcoming Star Wars film The Mandalorian and Grogu.
After discovering Star Wars as a 10-year-old kid in the summer of 1977, Favreau was working as an usher at a movie theater by the time Star Wars: Return of the Jedi arrived. The Mandalorian and Grogu is an opportunity for Favreau to crack open that metaphorical toy chest, exploring his love of creature features with the dejarik chess set come to life and promoting the Amanin into the spotlight from the shadows of Jabba the Hutt’s palace.
“To have the opportunity to present this [film] in a theater, not just to people who have always loved Star Wars, but to introduce a new generation to Star Wars, to know that you want to reach out and get people as excited about Star Wars as you are and to make them feel the way that I felt the first time I saw it…I think that’s a responsibility,” Favreau says. “And we’ve thought tremendously about this because we’ve been working together for so long. We want to make an experience that doesn’t rely upon somebody already loving Star Wars, but gives them an opportunity to fall in love with it the way we have.”
Archetypes and family connections
Promoted as a gritty western, the premiere of The Mandalorian surprised us all with the reveal of Grogu, a Force-sensitive alien in need of protection. “Always at its core, Star Wars is about people,” Favreau says, “the archetypes, the mythology, and the family connections. And what we’ve settled into here, and I don’t think people expected it when they first heard about the show so many years ago, was that it was going to be about parenthood. It was going to be about a father and a son.”
In The Mandalorian and Grogu, we’ll see Grogu continuing his training with his adoptive father Din Djarin. “Now he’s not just protecting the kid, but he’s also teaching the kid and preparing the kid, as we all do, for the future, and the passing of the baton from one generation to another.”
Behind the scenes, the film also incorporates generations of Star Wars creators, including stop motion animation legend Phil Tippett, model maker John Goodson, Industrial Light & Magic effects artists including Visual Effects Supervisor John Knoll, and Legacy Effects, the LA-based studio that brought Grogu and countless other practical creatures and alien costumes to life. “I think that’s where we really roll up our sleeves and get to play. And there’s the escape pod that comes out of the AT-AT, which is based on the mini rigs, Kenner Toys that never existed on screen, and the dragonsnake that comes from animation.”
The film will also introduce a grown-up version of Rotta, a muscled Hutt played by Jeremy Allen White. Favreau first discovered the character as he appeared in the Star Wars: The Clone Wars feature, a baby Huttlet and son of the famed Jabba the Hutt. “When people first heard about it, they thought it was a false rumor that we planted,” Favreau recalls with a laugh. The addition allows Favreau to explore a different kind of father and son relationship. “We all know Jabba. What is it like to be [his son] and how do you add dimension to it?”
Rounding out the newcomers to the cast are Sigourney Weaver as Colonel Ward and a cameo by Martin Scorsese voicing the Ardennian fry cook Hugo. Favreau says he watched Weaver connecting to Grogu in real time and made room for it in the storytelling. “Sigourney got such a kick out of Grogu,” Favreau says, noting that between takes she was talking to him, picking him up, wanting to take pictures. “That was one of her notes,” Favreau says. “Sigourney said, ‘I want to work with this guy.’ So, we created some moments that I think work very well.”
As for Scorsese, Favreau worked with the legendary director on The Wolf of Wall Street. Hugo is a nod to Rio Durant, the Ardennian pilot and cook that Favreau voiced in Solo: A Star Wars Story. “I’m such a fan. I was lucky enough to work on his film but I grew up watching his films,” Favreau notes. And once Scorsese signed on, the character design helped cement his portrayal. “We did the recording session and the animation teams were really inspired by his performance,” Favreau says. “I love the work that they did on that character.”
Read the interview in full here and see Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu in cinemas from May 22nd and buy your tickets for the USA at Fandango.com.
