When Disney purchased Lucasfilm back in 2012 and almost immediately announced that a brand new Star Wars trilogy was in the works, almost every high-profile directorial talent in Hollywood was rumored to be in the running to land the project that eventually became The Force Awakens.
J.J. Abrams was officially confirmed to be stepping behind the camera on Episode VII in January 2013, but before that a cavalcade of critical and commercial favorites were linked to the sci-fi blockbuster including David Fincher, Jon Favreau, Brad Bird, Guillermo del Toro, Matthew Vaughn and many more.
Ultimately, it was Steven Spielberg who suggested Abrams to the studio, and the rest went on to become increasingly contentious history. In an interview with Collider, Vaughn admitted that if he’d gotten the offer a decade ago he would have dropped everything and come running, but his priorities are much different these days.
“If you’d asked me that 10 years ago, I would have given Kingsman to Lucasfilm for free to get a go shooting a Star Wars film. So, yes, I would have loved to have done a film which was part of the Skywalker Saga. Out of all the IP I’m not involved with, Star Wars would always get my attention. Just if they rang; they’ve never rang me up, they’ve got no interest in working with me, just to be very clear.
I think they think I’m probably a little bit too, what’s the word, ‘maverick,’ maybe? But I would promise, if I did it, I would do my … I’m not saying, no one tries to make a good film a bad film, but I would be meticulous on trying to protect the legacy of something that I fell in love with movies for. So the answer, very long-winded answer, but yes, I’d like to.”
Given that he’s responsible for the R-rated, irreverent and singularly stylistic likes of Kick-Ass and Kingsman, it wouldn’t be difficult to envision Vaughn running into the dreaded creative differences were he to board a galaxy far, far away. In all honesty, he may have dodged a bullet by missing out on Star Wars, given his unique visual sensibilities and desire to do things his own way.
