Ben Mendelsohn Says Rogue One: A Star Wars Story Reshoots Were Business As Usual
Much has been made of the difficult production of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, a film that turned out a lot better than many fans feared at the time. But while the popular narrative goes that Gareth Edwards’ 2016 spinoff was in a state of pandemonium before Tony Gilroy swooped in and saved the day, some recent comments from Ben Mendelsohn suggest that the drama and panic around the project may have been blown out of proportion.
In an interview with THR, the Orson Krennic actor was asked if he was more nervous or relieved when the Michael Clayton director was brought in for reshoots, to which Mendelsohn responded that neither were the case.
“I wasn’t either of those, it was just a case, from my point of view, that they were going to be working multiple units. Gareth was writing and then he would come and film some things and Tony was shooting his material,” said Mendelsohn. “To me it’s a collaborative business, and this was just business as usual, and I’m so proud of that one.”
Mendelsohn’s characterization of events is a far cry from the description that Gilroy himself offered just last month, with the filmmaker recalling how the production was “in such a swamp” and “they were in so much terrible, terrible trouble that all you could do was improve their position.” Writer Chris Weitz painted an almost-as-chaotic picture a few months ago when he spoke of a crack team of scribes who were brought in, including Mission: Impossible – Fallout director Christopher McQuarrie. Weitz went on to admit that he was astonished by how well the film turned out given how many writers the script went through.
From the sound of things, the atmosphere around Rogue One: A Star Wars Story was a fair bit tenser than Mendelsohn is making it out to be, at least among the people who were actually responsible for writing and helming these reshoots. But whatever the situation was behind the scenes, most of us can agree that the final product could’ve been a lot worse, with the film evidently proving popular enough to spawn its own live action prequel series. Not bad, considering the end results of Solo’s troubled production.
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