Suvudu Universe

The Wall Street Journal‘s Ben Fritz recently sat down for an interview with Lucasfilm’s Kiri Hart. Ms. Hart is the Head of Development at Lucasfilm and head of the company’s “story group.”

The biggest challenge, she said at Lucasfilm’s San Francisco offices, is that while most movies and TV shows are creatively assembled first and then sold to a studio, “Star Wars” overseers have developed a release plan spanning years and now need movies, TV shows and other material to fill each slot…

For coming “Star Wars” movies, including Episodes VII, VIII and IX and three spinoff pictures that will be released between 2015 and 2020, Ms. Hart has developed ideas in-house and hired outsiders to execute them.

“I’ve been sitting down with filmmakers and writers, talking with them about what they love about ‘Star Wars,’ and playing matchmaker,” she said.

Along with developing movies and TV shows, Ms. Hart and her team of five are putting tighter parameters on the fictional timeline spanning thousands of years to keep the “Star Wars” storyline consistent in books, games and rides. In the process, she cast aside books that took place after “Return of the Jedi” and would contradict Mr. Abrams’s movie. (By contrast, Mr. Lucas allowed stories set in his fictional universe that were independent of the feature films’ narratives.)

Described as the Kevin Feige of the Star Wars universe, Ms. Hart seems to be off to a very good start in her new position. Everything we have seen from the fiction line, Star Wars Rebels and Episode VII is very encouraging about the franchise’s future.

To read the full story visit Wall Street Journal Online.

SOURCE: WSJ