J.J. Abrams explained why Oscar winning screenwriter Michael Arndt was surprisingly pushed out of writing Star Wars: Episode VII late last month. The Star Trek Into Darkness director cited the strict time frame imposed by Disney as the main reason he and Lawrence Kasdan took over.
While speaking with Deadline during a conference call about Fox’s Almost Human, the topic turned to Star Wars 7. Although he doesn’t mention Arndt, he said that the progress on the script was not moving as well as hoped.
“It became clear that given the time frame and given the process and the way the thing was going that working with Larry in this way was going to get us where we need to be and when we needed to be,” Abrams told the site.
He said that working with Kasdan, who worked on the scripts for both The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, is “kind of unbeatable.”
Back on Oct. 24, Disney and Lucasfilm announced that Kasdan and Abrams were taking over the script. Arndt, who wrote Little Miss Sunshine and co-wrote Toy Story 3, had been reportedly working on the project since before Disney bought Lucasfilm.
Abrams’ comments today confirm that Disney is adhering to a strict time table, which was reported last week. The studio wants the film out in 2015 and production is slated to start early next year.
Abrams is co-producing Almost Human, which premieres on Fox on Nov. 17.
image: Wikimedia Commons
