Kathleen Kennedy is stepping down as Lucasfilm CEO.
The 72-year-old govt has headed up the Star Wars and Indiana Jones studio since Disney acquired Lucasfilm from George Lucas in 2012, however Kennedy has now confirmed she shall be leaving her position to turn into a full-time producer – with upcoming tasks together with Star Wars: Starfighter and The Mandalorian and Grogu.
With Kennedy’s exit, Dave Filoni – who labored intently with Lucas on the animated present Star Wars: The Clone Wars and co-creates The Mandalorian sequence with Jon Favreau – will turn into Lucasfilm’s new President and Chief Artistic Officer, whereas Lynwen Brennan is to function Co-President.
Talking with Deadline, Kennedy mentioned: “Two years in the past, I went to [Disney CEO] Bob [Iger] and Alan [Bergman] to determine what the transition plan can be and I made the advice that or not it’s Dave Filoni and Lynwen Brennan, the latter of whom has been operating the enterprise alongside me.
“She comes out of ILM 16 years as the overall supervisor after which transitioned into being the overall supervisor for Lucasfilm. She has been my key monetary accomplice, my enterprise accomplice operating the corporate.
“Dave is the proper individual to transition, however he hadn’t made a film and I labored very intently with him starting with Rogue One to get him a really feel of how live-action works. His background is animation, as he labored with George on Clone Wars.
“Dave has now spent the entire seasons of Mandalorian working with Jon Favreau, who’s been an amazing mentor to him. After which he went off and did Ahsoka, which got here from a few of the tales he was telling in Clone Wars.
“He was capable of create the Season 1 of Ahsoka, and now he’s simply completed directing a few of Season 2, and writing all of the episodes. He completed that in October.
“However my level is, we’ve been speaking about this for 2 years.”
Kennedy – who produced E.T. the Further-Terrestrial, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Jurassic Park – added she was “” in utilising synthetic intelligence (AI) in her upcoming tasks.
She defined: “I’m thinking about exploring utilizing these instruments in accountable methods, and figuring out the problems round attempting to determine what we’re going to do when it comes to defending artists’ rights.
“That’s vitally necessary. However on the identical time, there’s nothing extra thrilling than having new instruments that may broaden on what you’re able to doing when it comes to creating visible language round tales.
“I’ve had a novel alternative to be round quite a lot of that over time and witness these modifications. I genuinely really feel like we’re getting into that second once more the place we’re going to see issues we’ve by no means seen earlier than. I simply suppose that’s actually thrilling.”
Kennedy additionally supplied updates on a few of the upcoming Star Wars films, together with James Mangold’s Daybreak of the Jedi, Taika Waititi’s movie and Donald Glover’s Lando Calrissian spinoff.
She mentioned: “I’ve acquired to tread a bit rigorously right here. Jim Mangold and Beau Willimon wrote an unimaginable script, however it’s positively breaking the mildew and it’s on maintain.
“Taika has turned in a script that I feel is hilarious and nice. It’s not simply my choice, particularly once I’ve acquired a foot out the door.
“Donald Glover has turned in a script. And as you may have learn, Steve Soderbergh and Adam Driver turned in a script written by Scott Burns [for the Kylo Ren spinoff The Hunt for Ben Solo]. It was simply nice. Something’s a risk if any person’s prepared to take a danger.”
Kennedy additionally commented on Rian Johnson’s Star Wars trilogy, which was introduced again when he launched The Final Jedi in 2017.
She defined: “As soon as he made the Netflix deal and went off to begin doing the Knives Out movies, that has occupied an enormous quantity of his time.
“That’s the opposite factor that occurs right here. After Shawn [Levy] and I began speaking about Star Wars [Starfighter], Stranger Issues kicks in and he was utterly consumed for some time by that. That’s what occurred with Rian.”
