Rogue One is one of the best-loved spin-off films in the Star Wars universe, having provided an intriguing backstory to the Death Star as well as spawning the much-lauded series Andor. However, there have long been rumors suggesting that the making of the movie was fraught behind the scenes.
Now director Gareth Edwards has shared the biggest insight yet into what actually happened. Speaking on KCRW’s The Business podcast, The Creator director said: "The stuff that's out there on the internet about what happened on that film… there's so much inaccuracy about the whole thing, and Tony [Gilroy] came in and he did a lot of great work for sure, no doubt about it. But we all worked together till the entire last minute of that movie…"
Reports at the time suggested that Lucasfilm had brought in Gilroy to take over production, removing Edwards for reshoots. This is something the director denies happened. "The very last thing that we filmed in the pickup shoot was the Darth Vader corridor scene," Edwards added. "I did all of that stuff."
Edwards has usually kept pretty tight-lipped about the making of Rogue One in the past so it’s interesting to get some added context. However, he did add that "what happens in Fight Club stays in Fight Club" and he doesn't want to speak negatively about the experience.
This echoes how he recently said to Variety that he feels "incredibly lucky" to have worked on the movie. "I got to make a Star Wars film," he said. "I won the lottery, in that sense. The idea of someone as privileged as me in any way implying that it was anything other than the amazing experience that it was to some extent – like, I don’t have any empathy for that person, and I don’t want to be that person either."
The director’s new sci-fi movie The Creator is out in theaters now. For more on that, check out our interview with him as well as what he had to say about ever returning to a franchise again after Rogue One.
