Solo: A Star Wars Story (2018) (1 Viewer)

[TravisR]

And the most important lesson for the LFL president, your gut feeling is maybe wrong, don't fire the director at the last minute.

Or she was right and the footage (which she was actually seeing) was a disaster and she made the best choice she could have. As I've said, I can't imagine things were good for Solo if they didn't just try to fix things a la Rogue One and instead felt they had to fire the directors due to what they were getting.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

I think the biggest lesson is that the moviegoing public wasn't very interested in a Han Solo who wasn't played by Harrison Ford.

I'd be more interested in exploring some of the other characters introduced in that movie: Emilia Clarke's Qi'ra and her role in the Imperial-era criminal underworld, or Erin Kellyman's Enfys Nest, and the very early days of the Rebellion.

 

[SamT]

Or she was right and the footage (which she was actually seeing) was a disaster and she made the best choice she could have. As I've said, I can't imagine things were good for Solo if they didn't just try to fix things a la Rogue One and instead felt they had to fire the directors due to what they were getting.

It was so bad that the directors went on and won an OSCAR for their next work?

 

[Jake Lipson]

It was so bad that the directors went on and won an OSCAR for their next work?

Yes. Because being right for Spider-Man (which they did NOT direct, by the way) does not mean they're right for Star Wars. Those are two completely different projects being told in different mediums and with different needs.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

We've been through this so many times with this specific member that I don't even know why I'm taking the bait, but here it goes.

The original directors were fired for cause. That's extremely rare in Hollywood. That the DGA didn't defend the directors or right for them to receive credits speaks volumes as to whether or not that cause was legitimate.

When you're making a $200 million tentpole with a locked-in deadline, as was the case with Solo, there are lots of moving pieces being worked on independently which have to come together just so. What the directors were doing was improvising on set and discarding large chunks of the script, spending days shooting what should have taken moments to do. Because their new improvisations weren't in the script, that meant that any of the footage that was being shot by the second unit and/or created by the special effects units couldn't integrate with the production footage. The directors were given instructions by their supervisors, multiple times, to shoot the script. They refused to do so. Towards the end of the production, they were told that they would need to start shooting the script. They reiterated that they had no intention of doing so. They were then fired for cause. Insubordination is a fire-able offense in any industry. Whether the directors had successes in the past, or would go on to have successes in the future, is entirely irrelevant to the discussion at hand. They were hired to do a specific job in a specific way. They did not do that job in the manner in which their supervisor hired them to do it. They were given multiple opportunities to correct their insubordinate behavior. They refused to make those changes.

If someone gets hired to be a chef at an award winning French restaurant to execute the menu that they've been serving for years, and after being hired to do that very specific task, decides to serve only Mexican food, regardless of what was on the menu or what diners ordered, that chef would be fired. It would be completely irrelevant whether or not the Mexican food the chef made was good. The point is, that's not what the chef was hired to make and not the meal the diners ordered. And a restaurant can't run if the chef decides to make whatever he wants regardless of what the restaurant is meant to serve. Imagine if you go and order duck l'orange and get served a burrito instead, and when you complain and say, "surely there must be a mistake," and the waiter responds, "There's no mistake; we understand what you asked for, but this is what the chef wants to make today." That chef needs to go, and it's no one's fault by the chef's.

It is bizarre that we're still going over this very basic, very simple point more than a year after the release of the film.

 

[Tino]

Exactly Jake and Josh. One has nothing to do with the other.

 

[Tino]

It is bizarre that we're still going over this very basic, very simple point more than a year after the release of the film.

Does that really surprise you??

 

[Malcolm R]

Yep, lots of Oscar-winning directors out there that are not suitable for a SW film.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Lord and Miller's Solo might have been a great movie, or it might have been a terrible one. But it wasn't the movie Lucasfilm wanted to make, and Lucasfilm was signing the checks.

 

[Tommy R]

It could happen. They can make it for the streaming service. They don't have to necessarily release it theatrically.

I would love it if they would incorporate Aldenreich and Glover (and Chewy of course) into some aspect of SW in the streaming things they are doing. As a fan of Solo the film I’d actually prefer something smaller scale rather than another big budget movie.

 

[Edwin-S]

We've been through this so many times with this specific member that I don't even know why I'm taking the bait, but here it goes.

The original directors were fired for cause. That's extremely rare in Hollywood. That the DGA didn't defend the directors or right for them to receive credits speaks volumes as to whether or not that cause was legitimate.

When you're making a $200 million tentpole with a locked-in deadline, as was the case with Solo, there are lots of moving pieces being worked on independently which have to come together just so. What the directors were doing was improvising on set and discarding large chunks of the script, spending days shooting what should have taken moments to do. Because their new improvisations weren't in the script, that meant that any of the footage that was being shot by the second unit and/or created by the special effects units couldn't integrate with the production footage. The directors were given instructions by their supervisors, multiple times, to shoot the script. They refused to do so. Towards the end of the production, they were told that they would need to start shooting the script. They reiterated that they had no intention of doing so. They were then fired for cause. Insubordination is a fire-able offense in any industry. Whether the directors had successes in the past, or would go on to have successes in the future, is entirely irrelevant to the discussion at hand. They were hired to do a specific job in a specific way. They did not do that job in the manner in which their supervisor hired them to do it. They were given multiple opportunities to correct their insubordinate behavior. They refused to make those changes.

If someone gets hired to be a chef at an award winning French restaurant to execute the menu that they've been serving for years, and after being hired to do that very specific task, decides to serve only Mexican food, regardless of what was on the menu or what diners ordered, that chef would be fired. It would be completely irrelevant whether or not the Mexican food the chef made was good. The point is, that's not what the chef was hired to make and not the meal the diners ordered. And a restaurant can't run if the chef decides to make whatever he wants regardless of what the restaurant is meant to serve. Imagine if you go and order duck l'orange and get served a burrito instead, and when you complain and say, "surely there must be a mistake," and the waiter responds, "There's no mistake; we understand what you asked for, but this is what the chef wants to make today." That chef needs to go, and it's no one's fault by the chef's.

It is bizarre that we're still going over this very basic, very simple point more than a year after the release of the film.

How do you know that any of what you are stating was actually the way things happened? Were you there or are you just taking Kathleen Kennedy's word that that is what was happening. You are making statements that indicate you have some kind of inside knowledge of what was going on on that set.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

There's no one in "Solo" who is so big at this point in their career that couldn't be gotten for a high budget streaming show, if Disney decided to go that route in the future. Donald Glover might be the hottest name of the cast at the moment, but even he's not that big that he couldn't be gotten.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

How do you know that any of what you are stating was actually the way things happened? Were you there or are you just taking Kathleen Kennedy's word that that is what was happening. You are making statements that indicate you have some kind of inside knowledge of what was going on on that set.

This was covered by multiple trade publications, both at the time of the firing and at the time of the film's release. Multiple people involved spoke both on and off the record, including the fired directors. I have been given no reason to doubt anything that's been reported.

As I mentioned earlier, the Director's Guild is notoriously litigious and very powerful in terms of protecting their members. Gareth Edwards, for instance, directed very little of what made it onscreen in Rogue One, but was given full credit for it. Zack Snyder directed very little of the finished Justice League movie, but was given full credit for it. That the DGA didn't challenge the removal of the Solo directors, and that Ron Howard received full credit, speaks volumes. If the substance of those reports were in serious dispute, the director's guild would have been behind the original directors 1000%. That the DGA didn't file any sort of injunction against Lucasfilm suggests that the DGA knew the conduct of the directors was not defensible.

 

[SamT]

Thanks for calling me specific. If you don't like a subject, just ignore it. It's not baiting, it came naturally in a specific discussion.

I read all the explanations provided here, I just don't accept it. No further explanation or repeating the same is necessary. I just don't accept it until they write a book or something in detail to explain what happened.

I understand, they write the checks and they have the right to do whatever they want with their product but that doesn't mean it's right. You are explaining that they ordered something and they didn't get it and they have the right to fire them. I get it. Yes they can, I'm just saying it's not necessarily right even if they have the right to do it.

Yes, you go and order a hamburger and the chef brings you something else, you can refuse the food, but where is the sense of adventure? Maybe this food is better, taste it. Try different things. Mix it up. Don't be stubborn. Don't throw it out because it is not what you ordered.

Also I do not accept the different mediums and different needs explanation. It's just my choice. Many people can fulfill different mediums and needs.

 

[Jake Lipson]

That the DGA didn't file any sort of injunction against Lucasfilm suggests that the DGA knew the conduct of the directors was not defensible.

It is my understanding that Lord and Miller voluntarily agreed to receive credit as executive producers and that they were not interested in contesting the directing credit. There would be nothing for the DGA to do if the affected members agreed to step aside.

Also I do not accept the different mediums and different needs explanation. It's just my choice. Many people can fulfill different mediums and needs.

Lord and Miller can. They have made animated films (Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, The Lego Movie) and live-action comedies (Jump Street) and have also worked in TV. But that doesn't mean they would be right for all projects.

Moonlight won Best Picture. That doesn't mean Kathleen Kennedy should approach Barry Jenkins to direct a Star Wars movie. Barry Jenkins is a great filmmaker, but his aesthetic does not match Star Wars. Similarly, the Oscar win for Spider-Verse validates that film as award-winning. It does not mean that Lord and Miller are automatically the right people for every project they touch. And, again, Lord and Miller are NOT the directors of Spider-Verse.

 

[Tommy R]

I know that some people HAVE blamed Kennedy herself for not firing them sooner, but is there anything (on or off record, and from anybody) explaining why she waited until the shoot was days away from done? (at least from what I’ve heard; that the firing came when there was a mere 10 days left of shooting) It just seems kind of insane that all this went down so late. I think that’s why people question the explanations given (NOT question as to deny, but question that there may be more to it that’s been kept under wraps).

 

[Malcolm R]

I know that some people HAVE blamed Kennedy herself for not firing them sooner, but is there anything (on or off record, and from anybody) explaining why she waited until the shoot was days away from done? (at least from what I’ve heard; that the firing came when there was a mere 10 days left of shooting) It just seems kind of insane that all this went down so late. I think that’s why people question the explanations given (NOT question as to deny, but question that there may be more to it that’s been kept under wraps).

Yeah, that's one part of the story that I've never understood. If things were off the rails for that long, why would they have been given such a long leash before they were finally yanked back?

An expensive tentpole film for a possible future franchise and you let this go on for 80-90% of the shooting schedule? Seems like they would have been given one warning, and when they ignored that, they would have been fired immediately.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

I know that some people HAVE blamed Kennedy herself for not firing them sooner, but is there anything (on or off record, and from anybody) explaining why she waited until the shoot was days away from done?

I think the situation was so unprecedented that she was really caught off guard by their behavior.

It's extremely rare to have this kind of insubordination, where you're very clearly telling your employees what they're required to do, and yet, they still won't do it. I think they were scrambling behind the scenes to see if there was any way to salvage the footage they had shot, both in terms of editing what was already shot and trying to get the directors to course correct. I think it was at that point, about ten days before the end of the shoot, where Kennedy and Kasdan and others from the editorial staff had tried to assemble the footage to see just how good or bad it was, and the damage was far worse than they had anticipated. They knew that reshoots would be required, which are always scheduled in advance on projects this big anyway. Apparently, Kennedy had a serious conversation with the directors where the intention would have been to allow them to finish the project but under the terms she set forth (i.e. "shoot the script"). But during this conversation, it became apparent to Kennedy that the directors would not change course, and that if they helmed the reshoots, it would simply be more of the same. At that point, Kennedy decided to best thing to do was to cut her losses and let them go. There was no point keeping them on if they were going to continue to shoot unusable footage and continue to refuse all attempts at course correction.

So I think that's the big thing - that over the course of shooting, they kinda brushed her off and would vaguely promise to improve and follow her directions, but never did, but then when confronted with that point blank, they basically admitted that they had no intention of changing course.

Again, this is a bizarre situation to have in a tentpole production. Kennedy may not have been prepared for it, but it's basically unprecedented in this tentpole era for a director to be insubordinate like this. I don't think it was apparent just how useless their footage was until the editors started working on putting together an assembly cut.

 

[Tommy R]

What is also bizarre is that Lord and Miller were not completely blacklisted from the business. I mean, if everything is true what is being said, that is insubordination on such a grand scale that they should never again work in film.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

I think it'll take years before we see the full fallout from this and how it affects their careers.

I don't think they'll ever be given jobs as "directors for hire" on a $200 million tentpole film again.

I think their previous work was successful enough that they will continue to be able to get comparable work to that. And I think they finally realized at the end just how badly they messed up; that they didn't go to the DGA and try to contest their removal from the film, but instead said, "we're voluntarily relinquishing credit" also speaks volumes. They made the politically correct move in the end by getting out of the way and not trying to force Lucasfilm into letting them finish the film. That may have been enough for them to sell the "we're great directors but this wasn't the right fit for us" line. But I don't think you'll ever see them get hired to helm anything under the Disney/Fox shingles again.