Long before J.J. Abrams brought the saga back to the big screen, Ben Affleck had a shot at launching the Star Wars sequel trilogy himself. The actor-director has now explained why he took himself out of the running to direct Star Wars: The Force Awakens — and it came down to knowing his own limits.
Affleck opened up about the sliding-doors moment on the latest episode of Josh Horowitz's Happy Sad Confused podcast, where he appeared in support of his new Netflix film Animals. During a career-spanning conversation, he confirmed that Lucasfilm and Disney had approached him about directing what became The Force Awakens. "Yeah they came to me and asked me, 'Hey, are you interested in this?'" Affleck said. "And I don't know that that meant they weren't also talking to JJ or other people, but I talked to those folks at the time."
Affleck liked Star Wars and considered himself a fan, but he did not believe he was the right filmmaker for the job. He thought someone with more passion for the franchise would make a better film — and he was candid that the decision was not "some great self-sacrificing thing." It was a judgment call about fit.
Part of his hesitation was the sheer difficulty of reinventing the galaxy far, far away. "A lot of challenges to reinventing that!" Affleck said, noting that it has not been easy for the franchise to reinvent itself — some entries have done really well — and that Star Wars has a fan base with "its own very strong opinions."
Watch the full interview here:
His bottom line was about pride in the work. "I don't think I can do it as well as somebody else, and I don't want to direct something that I don't feel like I have a chance to be really really proud of," he said. Affleck added that he has turned down plenty of directing scripts over the years, including ones he considered better than the scripts he was offered as an actor.
The same conversation also put another long-running rumor to rest. Affleck confirmed he never met with anyone about directing what became Man of Steel, shutting down years of speculation that he was once in line for the Superman reboot.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens ultimately went to J.J. Abrams, opening in 2015 as the first film of the sequel trilogy and grossing more than $2 billion worldwide. Affleck, meanwhile, went on to build his directing résumé with films like The Town, Argo, and now Animals, his sixth directorial feature — a Netflix kidnapping thriller about a principled politician pulled into a desperate situation.
Source: Happy Sad Confused
