Ewan McGregor speaks out on Obi-Wan Kenobi series production delay
Following yesterday’s breaking news about Disney+’s Obi-Wan Kenobi series being put on hold, Golden Globe Award-winning actor Ewan McGregor has finally addressed the issue in a recent press event for Birds of Prey, strongly dispelling previous reports about creative differences being the main reason why production has been delayed for the new Star Wars prequel spinoff series. He also confirmed that the series has not been cancelled and has just been pushed to a later production start date.
“We just pushed the shoot to the beginning of next year. The scripts are really good. I saw 90% of the writing and I really liked it,” McGregor said. (via Comic Book Movie) “All this bulls— about creative differences and all that stuff is, none of it true.”
McGregor further clarified that the production delay was due to the Lucasfilm executives ultimately deciding to make additional polishes to the upcoming series. “We just pushed the dates, they want — [the] last episode Episode IX just came out, everyone had more time to read the stuff that had been written, and they felt that they wanted to do more work on it. So they slid the shoot. It’s not nearly as dramatic as it sounds online.”
He also added that the fans shouldn’t worry about the delay because the Obi-Wan Kenobi series is still right on track for the studio’s original scheduled release date. “The show start shooting in January. I think they want to keep the same release date so it’s not really gonna affect the viewer in any way. It just simply gives them more time to write, make the scripts even better.”
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The new series will take place eight years after the events of Revenge of the Sith, where we last saw Obi-Wan delivering the infant Luke Skywalker to his Tatooine homestead. The series will directed by Deborah Chow. Chow, Amini, and McGregor will serve as Executive Producers alongside Kathleen Kennedy, Tracey Seaward (The Queen) and John Swartz (Rogue One: A Star Wars Story). Jason McGatlin, Lucasfilm’s Executive Vice President Production, will serve as co-producer.
McGregor took over the role of Obi-Wan for the Star Wars prequel trilogy two decades ago from the late Alec Guinness. His last live-action appearance was in 2005’s Revenge of the Sith. However, McGregor also lent his voice to Rey’s Force vision in The Force Awakens. Additionally, McGregor hasn’t been shy about his desire to reprise his role.
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Two years ago, director Stephen Daldry was supposedly lined up to direct a standalone Obi-Wan film. Unfortunately, the dismal box office performance of Solo: A Star Wars Story put all the spinoff movies on hold.
No other details about the potential Obi-Wan series are currently available. A few Star Wars novels and comics have explored Obi-Wan’s life on Tatooine between Episodes III and IV. Obi-Wan also had a memorable rematch with Darth Maul in Star Wars Rebels. But any story direction for the new show is simply conjecture at this point.
