Disney CEO Bob Iger released a report to all shareholders to update them on the Star Wars films status. These rights were acquired after Disney purchased Lucasfilm from George Lucas on December 12, 2012 for a whopping $4.05 billion. Because Lucas owned all of the company he pocketed every single dime.
“Next year, we’ll release our first standalone movie based on these characters, followed by Star Wars: Episode VIII in 2017, and we’ll finish the trilogy with Episode IX in 2019,” wrote Iger.
George Lucas participated in an interview with Robert Redford for a discussion on the independent film at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival. This discussion was give the title, Power of Story: Visions of Independence and it all took place at the Egyptian Theatre.
By the time Star Wars came around, American Graffiti was a huge, huge success. I had a deal with [Fox] that was $125,000 to write and direct Star Wars. After American Graffiti… I was the hottest director in Hollywood. They said, “Oh God! He’s going to ask for $1 million. No director’s ever asked for $1 million. What are we going to do?” And Fox was sort of on the ropes. So I went to them and I said, “Look: I’ll take my salary. I’m not going to ask for $1 million. I signed a deal memo, and that’s what I believe in. Everything that’s notmentioned in the deal memo, I’m going to re-look at.” And that was: sequels. I had already written three movies, and I knew I wanted to make them regardless of whether the first was a hit or not.